wondering whether the day of his downfall had
come at last, and whether you were the chosen
instrument for working it. You were—and you
have worked it. You were weak enough, as I
have heard, to try and save his life. If you had
succeeded, I should have looked upon you as my
enemy. Now you have failed, I hold you as my
friend. Your inquiries frightened him into the
vestry by night; your inquiries, without your
privity, and against your will, have served the
hatred and wreaked the vengeance of three-and-
twenty years. Thank you, sir, in spite of yourself.

"I owe something to the man who has done
this. How can I pay my debt? If I was a
young woman still, I might say, ' Come! put
your arm round my waist, and kiss me, if you
like.' I should have been fond enough of you,
even to go that length; and you would have
accepted my invitation—you would, sir, twenty
years ago! But I am an old woman, now. Well!
I can satisfy your curiosity, and pay my debt
in that way. You had a great curiosity to know
certain private affairs of mine, when you came
to see me—private affairs which all your sharpness
could not look into without my help—
private affairs which you have not discovered,
even now. You shall discover them; your
curiosity shall be satisfied. I will take any trouble
to please you, my estimable young friend!

"You were a little boy, I suppose, in the year
twenty-seven? I was a handsome young woman,
at that time, living at Old Welmingham. I had
a contemptible fool for a husband. I had also
the honour of being acquainted (never mind how)
with a certain gentleman (never mind whom).
I shall not call him by his name. Why should I?
It was not his own. He never had a name: you
know that, by this time, as well as I do.

"It will be more to the purpose to tell you
how he worked himself into my good graces. I
was born with the tastes of a lady; and he gratified
them. In other words, he admired me,
and he made me presents. No woman can resist
admiration and presents—especially presents,
provided they happen to be just the
things she wants. He was sharp enough to
know that—most men are. Naturally, he
wanted something, in return—all men do. And
what do you think was the something? The
merest trifle. Nothing but the key of the
vestry, and the key of the press inside it, when
my husband's back was turned. Of course he
lied when I asked him why he wished me to get
him the keys, in that private way. He might
have saved himself the trouble—I didn't believe
him. But I liked my presents, and I wanted
more. So I got him the keys, without my
husband's knowledge. I watched him, without his
own knowledge. Once, twice, four times, I
watched him—and the fourth time l found him out.

"I was never over-scrupulous where other
people's affairs were concerned; and I was not
over-scrupulous about his adding one to the
marriages in the register, on his own account.
Of course, I knew it was wrong; but it did no
harm to me—which was one good reason for not
making a fuss about it. And I had not got a
gold watch and chain—which was another, still
better. And he had promised me one from
London, only the day before—which was a
third, best of all. If I had known what the
law considered the crime to be, and how the
law punished it, I should have taken proper
care of myself, and have exposed him then and
there. But I knew nothing—and I longed for
the gold watch. All the conditions I insisted
on were that he should tell me everything. I
was as curious about his affairs then, as you
are about mine now. He granted my conditions
—why, you will see presently.

"This, put in short, is what I heard from him.
He did not willingly tell me all that I tell you
here. I drew some of it from him by
persuasion, some of it by questions. I was
determined to have all the truth—and I believe I got it.

"He knew no more than any one else of what
the state of things really was between his father
and mother, till after his mother's death. Then,
his father confessed it, and promised to do what
he could for his son. He died having done
nothing—not having even made a will. The son
(who can blame him?) wisely provided for
himself. He came to England at once, and took
possession of the property. There was no one
to suspect him, and no one to say him nay. His
father and mother had always lived as man and
wife—none of the few people who were acquainted
with them ever supposed them to be
anything else. The right person to claim the
property (if the truth had been known) was a
distant relation, who had no idea of ever getting
it, and who was away at sea when his father
died. He had no difficulty, so far—he took
possession, as a matter of course. But he
could not borrow money on the property as a
matter of course. There were two things
wanted of him, before he could do this. One
was a certificate of his birth, and the other was
a certificate of his parents' marriage. The
certificate of his birth was easily got—he was born
abroad, and the certificate was there in due form.
The other matter was a difficulty—and that
difficulty brought him to Old Welmingham.

"But for one consideration, he might have
gone to Knowlesbury instead. His mother had
been living there just before she met with his
father—living under her maiden name; the
truth being that she was really a married woman,
married in Ireland, where her husband had ill-
used her and had afterwards gone off with some
other person. I give you this fact on good
authority: Sir Felix mentioned it to his son, as
the reason why he had not married. You may
wonder why the son, knowing that his parents
had met each other at Knowlesbury, did not
play his first tricks with the register of that
church, where it might have been fairly presumed
his father and mother were married. The reason
was, that the clergyman who did duty at
Knowlesbury church, in the year eighteen hundred
and three (when, according to his birth-
certificate, his father and mother ought to have been
married), was alive still, when he took possession
of the property in the New Year of eighteen