"No," she replied, "not angry. But still, you must not speak to me like that!"

"I cannot help it," he replied. "Do you know that but for you I should not have been a Member of Parliament now?"

"But for me?"

"Yes," said Paul. "From the first time I saw you, just after I came out of Strangeways Jail, you've always inspired me, even while you angered me, and have determined me to win when otherwise I should have lost. Tell me honestly now, do you think I shall ever overcome life's handicap?"

"Does it not depend what the handicap is?"

"My handicap is that I'm nameless," he replied. "I told you the story, didn't I? At least, I tried to. Miss Bolitho, am I mad?"

"You are certainly talking very strangely."

"I hate your father," went on Paul, and his voice, although very quiet, was very intense. "The first time I saw him I hated him. No, no one is listening, you need not fear. I believed he was the tool of the Wilsons. I believe it still! I don't think he fought me fairly either. I think he dislikes me, too. But, but--shall I tell you something?"

"I think you had better not," she replied. Even although she was surrounded by a crowd of people, and their voices were wellnigh lost in the hum of conversation, she was afraid.

"I do not think I can help myself. Miss Bolitho, I have been sustained in all the work of my life by one thought--I want to win you for my wife! Do you think it's possible?" And then, without waiting for her reply, he went on: "It must be possible. It shall be possible! I will make it so."

"I must ask you to excuse me. I have some friends over here wishing to speak to me."

"Not yet," he said. "You must forgive my rudeness, but when a man feels as I feel, and have felt for years, niceties of behaviour don't count. You, in spite of everything, have become the one thing in life worth living for, and yet I ought to be ashamed of speaking to you now.

I have no right!"

She looked at him wonderingly, as if not understanding what he meant.

"You see, I have no name," he said. "I don't know who my father is or where he is. I only know that he and my mother were married in Scotland, and he left her the day after the wedding. She, in her trouble, went to her mother's old home in Cornwall, and was looked upon as a poor outcast thing. She lay down on a bank near a little hamlet called Stepaside, and thought she was going to die. From there she was taken to a workhouse, where I was born. She would not tell her name, and that was why I was called Stepaside. It's a terrible handicap, isn't it? No father, no name! Ned Wilson made the most of that at the election; but there, I've fought it down so far. Will you promise me something? I hope you will, I think you will. I don't think I'm altogether a clown, and I feel sometimes as though I can do great things if you---- You see, you are everything to me, everything!

Promise me this: If I find out who my father is, may I speak to you again? Do you think--do you think it is possible for you----?"

At that moment some acquaintances came up, and Mary Bolitho turned as if to leave him.

"But give me an answer before you go!" he said eagerly. "Is there any possibility--in spite of my handicap?" And then he felt that his heart had, for a moment, ceased to beat. He forgot where he was. The chatter of the crowd was nothing to him; it did not exist.

"Everything is possible to a man who doesn't know when he's beaten!"

she said with a radiant smile, and then turned towards her friends.

Paul remembered little of what took place after that, and he soon found himself walking near Hyde Park alone. It was very wonderful to him--so wonderful that he could not altogether realise it. She had seemed to promise him so much, even though she had said so little. He felt as though the sky had become higher, the world bigger. He had never dared to hope for so much, never dreamt she would speak to him so kindly.

They belonged to different worlds, were reared amidst different a.s.sociations, and yet she had not treated him with scorn. Yes, everything was possible! And he would translate that possibility into the actual. He would win her a name and a position that even she might be proud of. For he had idealised her. To him she was far removed from all the others that he had ever met, and he must do something worthy of her. For hours he walked around the Park alone, wondering how he should begin to carry out the object nearest and dearest to his heart. Poor Paul, he knew little of the ways of the world, especially of the world in which Mary Bolitho lived. Among the lads and la.s.ses in Brunford courtship and marriage were very simple. The boy met his girl there, and they married each other without difficulty. But Paul knew that there were certain formalities that had to be complied with in the cla.s.s to which Mary Bolitho belonged. She was a judge's daughter, and he, although he had succeeded beyond his hopes, was still looked upon as little more than a working man. One thing, he knew he ought to ask Judge Bolitho for his permission to seek his daughter's hand. He had no right to pay her attentions otherwise. It was a frank and honourable course of action, too, and appealed to him strongly, and if he succeeded, then the way was made plain. Not that he liked the idea altogether, for he had still an instinctive hatred of the man who had treated him, as he believed, so unfairly. But he must destroy that hatred now. He must think kindly of the father of the woman who was all the world to him.

Before the night was over he wrote Judge Bolitho a letter, asking for his permission to try and win Mary Bolitho for his wife. He did not refer to the shadow that rested upon his name, told him nothing of what he had said to Mary. He only told him of his hopes and ambitions, and of his undying love.

Three days later the answer came, and when Paul read it his heart was filled with black rage. It contained only a few words, but they seemed to blot out the sun from his horizon. Without saying so in so many words, Judge Bolitho treated the proposal made in his letter with thinly veiled scorn and contempt. He made him feel, although he did not say so, that what he had said was an impertinence. It was true the letter was couched in terms of politeness, and yet it might have been written to a groom who had the temerity to seek his mistress's hand, and it contained a command that he must never dare to speak to her again.

Paul was scarcely master of himself as he read, and every evil pa.s.sion of his nature was aroused. This man had added insult to injury. Ever since the day of his trial he had been his enemy, and now he had sent him this! "But I will speak to her again," he vowed. "I will win her in spite of everything; by fair means or foul she shall be mine!"

Shortly afterwards he returned to Brunford for the Christmas vacation.

Only a few days were allowed by the leader of the Government, because much and important business had to be transacted; but those few days were destined to change the course of Paul Stepaside's life. His mother met him when he returned to Brunford with unusual manifestations of affection. He had sent her a copy of the _Times_, wherein was a full report of his speech. He had also forwarded to her a number of other papers which had spoken kindly of him, and she was elated beyond measure at his success. To her Paul was everything, the one object of her love, the one hope of her life. For him she would brave everything, suffer everything. In her inmost heart there was only one thing she desired, and that was Paul's happiness. She had stifled all thoughts of jealousy when she had learnt that Paul loved the daughter of the man who had treated him so badly. She would have loved to have had him all to herself, so that they might have been all in all to each other, but she had seen into his heart, and knew that he loved this girl. And he must have her, and whatever stood in his way must be removed. For that she lived and thought and planned.

The day before his home-coming she had seen that which grieved her sorely, and angered her beyond words. A local newspaper had it that Ned Wilson and Mary Bolitho were engaged, and she wondered how she could break the news to her boy. That the engagement should be broken she had fully made up her mind--no matter what happened Paul must have the woman of his choice!

After dinner they sat alone in the little room on which Paul had bestowed so much attention, and she wondered whether he had beard the news which bad brought her so much pain.

"It was a great speech you made, Paul!" she said, when they had been sitting quietly for some time.

"Nonsense, mother!" was his reply. "Nonsense; it was a failure!"

"No, no. I read every word, Paul, and it was not a failure. You're going to be a great man, my son!"

He laughed bitterly. He remembered the letter which Judge Bolitho had written to him. "I feel as though I don't care about anything!" he went on at length. "What's the good of success? What are we in the House of Commons, after all, but a lot of voting machines? What does it matter which party is in power?"

"Nay, nay, Paul. That's not like you to talk so!"

"I'm tired of it--tired of everything!" he went on.

"You're thinking about that la.s.s!" said his mother, and although he made no reply, she knew she was right.

"Have you ever seen her?" she asked at length.

He nodded.

"And done nothing, I expect?"

"I wrote to her father," was his reply. "I asked him in a straightforward, honourable manner to let me try and win her for my wife."

The woman's eyes shone bright with excitement. "And, and----?" she said.

"Here's his letter!" he replied. "I carry it around with me to tell myself what a fool I've been. You can read it if you like! You can see it's written in the third person, and evidently typed by his secretary. That of itself is an insult, when one bears in mind the kind of letter I wrote to him!"

The woman read it carefully, word by word. She could not help seeing the insult contained in every line, could not help realising that Judge Bolitho regarded Paul's request as an unpardonable piece of impertinence.

"Can't you be happy without her?" she asked at length.

"Never!" he replied. "Everything I may get in life could be but Dead Sea fruit now! Oh, mother, if only I had a name, if we could find out the truth!"

He was sorry he had spoken the moment the words pa.s.sed his lips. He saw that her face became hard and set, that her eyes burnt with deadly anger. "Do you know that she is engaged to young Wilson?" she asked at length.

"What!"

"It's all over the town, Paul; there can be no doubt about it! It's in the newspaper."

"She does not care for him!" he cried. "She cannot!"

"But he'll be one of the richest men in Lancashire, Paul!"

"But she could not! She could not!"

"Perhaps it explains this letter," said his mother. "Judge Bolitho has doubtless set his heart upon his daughter marrying a rich man, and her feelings are not considered. But don't give up hope, Paul. Don't give up hope. Ned Wilson shall never have her!"