It is not long since all England was interested in the trial of a
so-called gentleman for murder. He was found guilty, condemned and
executed. At the time of the trial all the papers spoke of his little
son--a fair-haired little lad, who was as unconscious of all that
happened as a little babe. I have often wondered what became of him.
Does he hear his father's name? Do those with whom he lives know him for
a murderer's son? If he goes wooing any fair-faced girl, will she be
afraid of marrying him lest, in the coming years, she may suffer the
same fate his mother did? Does that same son, when he reads of criminals
and scaffolds, wince, and shudder, and grow sick at heart?

And the daughters, do they grow old and die before their time? Do they
hide themselves under false names in silent places, dreading lest the
world should know them? Does any man ever woo them? Are they ever happy
wives and mothers?

I have thought much on this subject, because I, who write this story,
seem to the world one of the most commonplace people in it, and yet I
have lived, from the time I was a child, in the midst of a tragedy dark
as any that ever saddened this fair land.

No one knows it, no one guesses it. People talk of troubles, of
romances, of sad stories and painful histories before me, but no one
ever guessed that I have known perhaps the saddest of all. My heart
learned to ache as the first lesson it learned in life.

When I think of those unhappy children who go about the world with so
dark a secret locked in their hearts, I think of myself, and what I hold
locked in my heart.