Royson being even a second mate on sufferance, so to
speak--the aspect of your affairs changes materially when your suitor
becomes Sir Richard Royson, Baronet, with a fine estate and a rent-roll
of five thousand pounds a year."
"How can you possibly know that?" gasped Irene, spilling half her tea
in sheer excitement.
"It is more than possible--It is true. I happen to be aware of the
facts. That thrice fortunate young man came into our lives at a moment
when, by the merest chance, I was able to acquire some knowledge of his
family history. His uncle, the twenty-sixth baronet, I believe,
sustained an accident in childhood which unhappily made him a cripple
and a hunchback. He grew up a misanthrope. He hated his only brother
because he was tall and strong as befitted one of the race, and his
hatred became a mania when Captain Henry Royson married a young lady on
whom the dwarf baronet had set his mind. There never was the least
reason to believe that she would have wed Sir Richard, but that did not
prevent him from pursuing her with a spite and vindictiveness that
earned him very bad repute in Westmoreland.
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