nly a murderer,
but a parricide,--had killed my own father for the sake of a few hundred
pounds, which I now knew that I could never enjoy, chilled me into a
stupid, hardened apathy. There could be no forgiveness for a crime like
mine, neither in this world--nor in the world to come.

I could have cursed my wretched mother for having so long concealed from
me an important fact, which, if known, had saved the life of her
worthless paramour. Her silence might have been the effect of shame. But
no--when I recalled the frequency of Mr. Carlos's visits, his uniform
kindness to me, the very last conversation I held with him, and the dark
hints that from time to time Bill Martin had so insultingly thrown out,
I felt convinced that she had all along been living with him on terms of
abandoned intimacy, and that her crime had been the parent of my own.
Yet, in spite of these bitter recriminations, when I raised my eyes to
her, and met her sad, pleading, tearful glance, all my love for her
returned, and, clasping her knees, as I still sat upon the ground at her
feet, I said, "Mother, why did you keep this guilty secret from me for
so many years? I should have felt and acted very differently towards
that unhappy man, if I had known that he was my father."

"Noah, it is hard to acknowledge one's sin to one's own child. It is a
sin, however, that I have been bitterly punished for committing."

"But you still continued to live on those terms with him?"

"Alas! Noah, I loved him!"

She threw her apron over her head, and sobbed as if her heart would
burst.

"I will show you, Mother, how one crime produces another," I was about
to say, when a loud rap at the door recalled my self-possession; and I
was summoned to attend the sitting of the magistrates, and tell all I
knew about the murder.

CHAPTER XX.

A LAST LOOK AT OLD FRIENDS.

I made my deposition minutely and circumstantially, from the time of my
conversation with Adam Hows until the time when, accompanied by George
Norton, we encountered him and Bill Martin in the plantations, and took
the latter prisoner. My statement was so clear, so plausible, so
perfectly matter-of-fact, that this hideous lie was received by wise and
well-educated men as God's truth. I heard myself spoken of as a sober,
excellent young man, well worthy of the confidence and affection of the
'Squire, and extremely grateful for the many favours he had bestowed
upon me; while the character that