Behind his back you employ a lawyer to
advance him your own money to pay your own debt. You decline to give a
single penny away in charity and, as stealthily as possible, you give
away in one year greater sums than any other man has ever parted with.
You decline to help the poor little orphan child of the village
organist, and secretly you have her brought up in your own home, and
stop the sale of your pictures for the sake of the child whom you had
only once contemptuously addressed. Can you deny any one of these
things?"
"No!" Wingrave answered quietly, "I cannot."
"And I thought you a strong man," Aynesworth continued, aggrieved and
contemptuous. "I nearly went mad with fear when I heard that it was
you who were the self-appointed guardian of Juliet Lundy. I looked
upon this as one more, the most diabolical of all your schemes!"
Wingrave rose to his feet, still and grave.
"Aynesworth," he said, "this interview does not interest me. Let us
bring it to an end. I admit that I have made a great failure of my
life. I admit that I have failed in realizing the ambitions I once
confided to you. I came out from prison with precisely those
intentions, and I was conscious of nothing in myself or my nature to
prevent my carrying them out. It seems that I was mistaken. I admit
all this, but I do not admit your right to force yourself into my
presence and taunt me with my failure. You served me well enough, but
you were easily hoodwinked, and our connection is at an end.
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