look back upon that time and see myself raving on the very brink of
madness. I had known that George was acquainted with Caroline
Springer--indeed, I had proudly introduced him to her. I will tell my
story, though, and not discourse. But it is hard for an old man to be
straightforward. If he has read much he is discursive, and if he has
not read he is tedious with many words. I didn't leave Salem at once.
I met George, and he did not even attempt to apologize for the wrong
he had done me. He repeated the fool saying that all is fair in love.
'You ought to be glad that you discovered her lack of love in time,'
he said. This was consolation, surely. My mind may never have been
well-balanced, and I think that at this time it tilted over to one
side, never to tilt back. And now my love, trampled in the mire, arose
in the form of an evil determination. I would do my brother and his
wife an injury that could not be repaired. I did not wish them dead; I
wanted them to live and be miserable. A year passed, and a boy was
born. I left my native town and went west. I lived there nearly three
years, and then I sent to a Kansas newspaper an account of my death.
It was printed, and I sent my brother a marked copy of the paper. Two
weeks later I was in Salem. I wore a beard, kept myself close, and no
one recognized me. I waited for an opportunity. It came, and I stole
my brother's boy. I went to Boston, to Europe, back to America; lived
here and there, and you know the rest. My dear boy, I repented
somewhat, and it was my intention, at some time, to restore you to
your parents, but you yourself were their enemy; you crept into my
heart and I could not pluck you out. For a time the story of your
mysterious disappearance filled the newspapers. You were found in a
hundred towns, year after year, and when your sensation had run its
course, you became the joke of the paragraphers. It was no longer,
'Who struck Billy Patterson?" but 'Who stole Henry Witherspoon?' Once
I saw your father in New Orleans. He had come to identify his boy; but