Standing between the bed where Esther lay and young Mowbray, Lebeau did not move.
"Excuse me, my lord," he said steadily, "it is you who are to leave. You will not lay a finger upon this child."
"_Because she is my daughter and your sister!_"
For an instant Mowbray stood transfixed with amazement; then he burst into a laugh.
"By my soul!" he exclaimed, "my father was right: you are the most amusing rascal in the world! Long live Lebeau! No human being but you could have conceived such an idea. The day that my father awoke in the bottom of that monster pie, the surprise was good, but it cannot hold a candle to this one! After this night's affair no one can ever say that you are degenerating; for your imagination, my dear man, was never so brilliant. Ask me a hundred pounds, or twice that amount; I will refuse you nothing. But go away now and let the farce end. I have enough of it."
"I shall not go, and this is no farce. I repeat, Esther Woodville is your sister."
"Would you have me believe that Lady Mowbray--"
"Lady Mowbray was a saint! May she hear and pardon me!"
"Mock if you will, for you will not mock long. Lady Mowbray had nothing whatever to do with this affair; moreover, Lady Mowbray was a stranger to your birth, sir!"
This time the young nobleman recoiled in rage.
"Listen to me," said Lebeau authoritatively.
Esther was beginning to recover a vague consciousness. Athwart the shadows of her swoon thought began to reassert itself, though doubtful, timid, misty. Stretched upon the bed, incapable of movement, her eyes closed, she heard voices without comprehending what they said, without distinguishing the sense of what was spoken.
"Twenty-three years ago," continued Lebeau, "two women were _enceintes_ at the same time, the wife and the mistress of Lord Mowbray, one at his residence in St. James's, the other in a chamber of his 'Folly' at Chelsea. The latter was the daughter of a London shop-keeper, whom Lord Mowbray had abducted from her family, and had concealed as his prisoner. It was Fate's decree that his lordship should be made a father twice in one and the same night. He called my attention to your vigor and vitality when you came into the world. 'Look, Lebeau,' he said to me, 'it is a genuine love-child. See how strong he is, while the other--' Then a thought occurred to him: why not substitute the illegitimate for the legitimate child? He hated his wife as he hated all things good and pure. The thought of rearing the child of a rival charmed him, and he considered me worthy to execute the change. It was I who bribed the young nobleman's nurse and placed you in his cradle. When your mother's health was re-established Lord Mowbray washed his hands of her and the child whom she believed hers. It was enough for him that the child should be dispossessed of his fortune and title; he desired that he should be wretched, deprived of everything. He knew that the family of his mistress, inflexible as they were in principles, would close their doors upon the fallen girl and her child. At rest upon this point, he forbade me to give the sufferers aid, and I disobeyed him."