KENNETH GALT was now living the life of a recluse¹ in his old home. The tendency to this sort of existence belongs to rare and exceptional temperaments². He kept assuring himself that it was to be only for a time, that when Sylvester returned with his stately niece he would crawl out of his morbid³ husk and bask⁴ in their genial⁵ hospitality. Of course, he told himself, this gloomy period of solitary⁶ self-accusation simply must not continue. He had taken steps which no living man could retrace⁷ in his decision in regard to Dora’s fate and the fate of her child, and there was nothing left for him to do but to try to forget his part in the tragedy. If he now feared that he might never again have complete peace of mind in regard to the girl’s condition, it was due to his present unwise proximity⁸ to her, and to his queer, almost ecstatic, pride in his son. Some men are coarse enough to have a contempt for the rights, social and otherwise, of their own children of illegitimate birth; but Kenneth Galt, in despising many of the laws of man, gave little Lionel the credit of being the product of a law he himself had made, and which, therefore, was worthy⁹ of consideration. In some States the declaration by a pair that they intend to live together constitutes a legal marriage, and it was with that broad view that Dora, blinded by faith in the superior knowledge of her lover, had unquestioningly delivered herself. He shuddered¹⁰ as the conviction struck into him that, under the same temptation that had

分享到：