I will beg, starve for you as long as you love me; but
you know I am hot-tempered, and when you are cross I get angry; and then
you are violent, and I am hard and sullen and wicked--oh, so wicked! I
think I must have lived fifty years in the last five years, Howel, I
feel so old and altered. Don't make me so hard-hearted again, Howel,
bach, or I shall die, indeed I shall; I feel it now at my heart.'

Netta put her hand on her heart as she leant against Howel. He raised
her, and saw that she was of a deathly paleness.

'Don't be--frightened--I have--it--often--only--a spasm,' she gasped, as
frightened he went to the sideboard, and poured out some brandy into one
of the tea cups, and putting a little water to it, gave it her to drink.

She soon revived, and recovering a little of her old colour again, put
her arms round Howel, and thanked him for being so kind. Howel was
aware, for the first time for many years, that conscience is not a myth;
his smote him.

'Will you stay at home to-day, Howel?' asked Netta. 'I will write myself
to your mother, if you will.'

'Yes, Netta, dear, I will. Now, shall we carry the picture-book to
Minette?'

'No; you must have your breakfast now, and I will make it. Oh! I am so
happy.'

'And you do not care for Dancy, Netta?'

'No; I hate him.'

Howel kept his word, and stayed at home that one day with Netta and her
child, and she wrote that day down on the tablets of her memory as the
brightest spot in six years of trouble and distrust.

CHAPTER XXXVIII.

THE FORGER.

In a few days Mrs Griffith Jenkins arrived in London, equally surprised
and delighted by the invitation she had received from her son and
daughter-in-law. Netta kept her word, and behaved to her with all the
kindness and consideration she could assume. She took her to various
places of amusement, and tried to find pleasure herself in scenes that a
few years before would have given her great delight; but the forebodings
of coming evil hung heavily over her, and she could not rouse herself
into her old spirits. Howel was very kind to her when with her; but
after that one white day he was not much at home. He went out once or
twice with her and his mother in the evening, and was so very attentive
to the latter that she began to think herself a person of consideration
once more.

'There's kind Howels is, Netta, fach!' she would say. 'There's proud you
ought to be to be having such a kind husband. But he