--if he
is the father of my betrothed wife. But, by heaven, he shall apologize
and that right humbly, or else I'll--but pshaw! the old fellow was so
enraged that he didn't know what he was saying. The epithet was simply
a gratuitous insult which he in his anger was scarcely responsible for.
But what could have turned him so completely against me?" Thus Abner
tormented himself, his thoughts ever revolving about the puzzling
question. At times he would find some comfort in the belief that the
allusion to his parentage meant nothing but that Gilcrest was
senselessly enraged when he made it. Then again, when he remembered
that it was by accident that he himself had discovered his father's
name, or when he thought of Richard and Rachel Dudley's singular
reticence, and of Dr. Dudley's evident uneasiness and reluctance when
pressed for the details of the life of Mary Hollis and John Logan, a
sickening foreboding of he knew not what would seize him. "There's
something about my father's and mother's life that Uncle Richard has
always concealed from me," he would conclude, "and whatever it is, I
must learn it. It's no use to write; I must see uncle face to face, and
demand a full revelation. Much as I dread another long, lonely journey,
it must be made, and that at once, if I am ever to know peace again.
Everything is at a standstill: my hopes of Betty, my farm work, my
other business. In no direction can I proceed, until I have solved this
mystery. There may be nothing in it--surely there isn't, and I am
tormenting myself unnecessarily. Still, if what Gilcrest said, meant
nothing more, it certainly indicated most forcibly his extreme
animosity to me; and I am convinced that the solution to his altered
demeanor can best be discovered by another journey to Williamsburg."

It was getting late in the season, and farm work was pressing; but
Mason Rogers promised that he would superintend the two negro men Abner
had hired from Squire Trabue for the corn-planting, and that he and
Henry would do all in their power to see that affairs at the farm on
Hinkson Creek went on smoothly.

In addition to the facts already narrated in regard to Abner's parents,
this was the story he heard the evening of his arrival in Williamsburg,
as he and his uncle sat together in Dr. Dudley's office:

After an absence of several months, John Logan came to see Mary in the
spring after the birth of his child. Mary had endured great privations
and had led a