things. I left
the child, for a year, with some people I knew, a few miles out of
Southampton; came up to London, bought a show, and started. It was
lonely work, at first; but, after a year, I fetched the child away, and
took her round the country with me, and for four years had a happy time
of it.

"I had chosen this part of the country, and, after a time, I became
uneasy in my mind, as to whether I was doing right; and whether, for
the child's sake, I ought not to tell you that she was alive, and offer
to give her up, if you were willing to take her. I heard how your son's
death had changed you, and thought that, maybe, you would like to take
his daughter; but, before bringing her to you, I thought she should
have a better education than I had time to give her, and that she
should be placed with a lady, so that, if you took her, you need not be
ashamed of her manners.

"I hoped you would not take her. I wanted to keep her for myself; but
my duty to her was clear.

"And now, squire, you know all about it. I have been wrong to keep her
so long from you, I grant; but I can only say that I have done my duty,
as far as I could, and that, though I have made many mistakes, my
conscience is clear, that I did the best, as far as it seemed to me at
the time."

Chapter 5: A Quiet Time.

As the sergeant was telling the story, the squire had sat with his face
shaded by his hand, but more than one tear had dropped heavily on the
table.

"I wish I could say as much," he said sadly, when the other ended. "I
wish that I could say that my conscience is clear, Mr. Wilks. I have
misjudged you cruelly, and that without a tithe of the reason, which
you had, for thinking me utterly heartless and cruel. You will have
heard that I never got those letters my son wrote me, after he was ill,
and that, when I returned home and received them, I posted to
Southampton, only to find that I was too late; and that, for a year, I
did all in my power to find the child. Still, all this is no excuse. I
refused to forgive him, returned his letters unanswered, and left him,
as it seemed, to his fate.

"It is no excuse to say that I had made up my mind to forgive him, when
he was, as I thought, sufficiently punished. He did not know that. As
to the poverty in which you found him, I can only plead that I did not
dream that he would come to that. He had, I knew, some money, for I had
just sent him his half-year's allowance before he wrote to me