Chapter Forty-nine
Deronda, in parting from Gwendolen, did not tell her he was going away, lest Grandcourt should infer that the fact was important to her.
He was actually going abroad under circumstances so momentous that when he called on her, he was already affected by solemn emotion.
Sir Hugo had sent a note to his chambers– “Come immediately. Something has happened.” Expecting bad news on entering the baronet’s study, he was relieved to be received with affection. However, there was a subdued emotion in Sir Hugo’s voice, as he said–
“Sit down, Dan. I have something to say.”
Deronda obeyed, not without presentiment. It was extremely rare for Sir Hugo to show so much serious feeling.
“I hardly expected that this would ever happen. There have been reasons why I have never prepared you for it, and never told you anything about your parentage.”
Sir Hugo paused, but Deronda could not trust his voice to speak, with so much hanging on this moment when the secrecy was to be broken. Sir Hugo went on with anxious tenderness.
“I have acted in obedience to your mother’s wishes. The secrecy was her wish. But now she desires to see you. This letter, which you can read later, will tell you what she wishes you to do, and where you will find her.”
Sir Hugo held out a letter written on foreign paper, which Deronda thrust into his breast-pocket, relieved that he was not called on to read it immediately. His composure shaken, Sir Hugo found it difficult to say more. And Deronda’s whole soul was possessed by a question which was the hardest in the world to utter. Yet he could not bear to delay it. At last he looked at Sir Hugo, and said, with a tremulous reverence in his voice, dreading to convey any reproach–
“Is my father also living?”
The answer came: a low emphatic “No.”
Some light had fallen on the past for Sir Hugo too in this interview. The baronet said, in a tone of confession–
“Perhaps I was wrong, Dan, to undertake what I did. I liked having you all to myself. But if you have had any pain, I ask you to forgive me.”
“The forgiveness has long been there,” said Deronda. “The chief pain has always been on account of my mother. But my affection for you has made a large part of my life.”
And with one impulse the two men clasped each other’s hands.
BOOK VII: THE MOTHER AND THE SON