"Revenge has come!" groaned forth the unfortunate man. "Is it not enough
that my child, that high-souled, noble creature, knows of my guilt! All
this day, and yesterday too, she would not see me. I know how it is--I
am as a leper in her eyes."
"Your daughter!--your daughter know your crime!" said the Buccaneer:
"How, how was that?--Who told, who could have told her such a
thing?--who had the heart?--But stay!" he continued, with his rude but
natural energy, the better feelings of his nature coming out at once,
when he understood what the baronet must have endured under such
circumstances:--"stay, you need not tell me; there is but one man upon
earth who could so act, and that man is Sir Willmott Burrell.--The
villain made a shrewd guess, and fooled ye into a confession. I see
through it all!--And are you so mean a coward?" he continued, turning
upon Sir Robert a look of ineffable contempt--"are you cowardly enough
to sacrifice your daughter to save yourself? I see it now; the secret
that Burrell has wormed from you is the spear that pushes her to the
altar; and you--you suffer this, and sell her and her lands to stay
his tongue! Man, man, is there no feeling at your heart? Have ye a
heart? I--I--a rude, untaught savage, whose hands are stained with
blood, even to the very bone; who have been as a whirlwind, scattering
desolation; over the deck of whose vessel has floated the pennon of
every land, working destruction as a pastime; I, myself, would brand
myself as a brigand and a Buccaneer--scorch the words, in letters of
fire, on my brow, and stand to be gazed upon by the vile rabble at every
market-cross in England, sooner than suffer my humble child to
sacrifice the least portion of herself for me!"
Dalton paused for breath; Sir Robert Cecil hid his face from the
flashing of his angry eye.
"Dalton!" he said at length, "I cannot do it, honoured as I have been,
bearing so long an unspotted name, venerated at the court, praised by
the people! Besides, I am sure Sir Willmott loves her; his whole conduct
proves----"
"--Him to be what I have often declared him, and will again once more--a
double-distilled villain!" interrupted the Buccaneer with renewed
energy. "But what is this to me?" he added, stopping abruptly in the
midst of his sentence--"What have I to do with it? My revenge upon you
both is certain, unless my own purpose be accomplished--and it shall be
accomplished for my child's sake. I will find out Sir Willmott, and tell
him so to his teeth. Sir Robert Cecil, farewell! You, I suppose, are a
courtly, a gentlemanly father! Pity that such should ever have
children!" and gathering his cloak around him, he left the room without
uttering another word.