be real awkward to say to all your respectable friends that you'd been
sailing under false colours; that 'White' isn't your _bona fide_
cognomen; that you'd deserted a helpless old woman to come away; and as
to _how you left your home_--the sort of _carriage_ you took to, my
dear, and how you got over the waggoner to do the work of a sexton--Oh,
my, fine tale for Chellaston, that! No, my dear young lady, take a
fatherly word of admonition; your best plan is to make yourself easy
without the tin."

He looked at her, even now, with more curiosity than malice in his
smiling face. A power of complete reserve was so foreign to his own
nature that without absolute proof he could not entirely believe it in
her. The words he was speaking might have been the utter nonsense to her
that they would have been to any but the girl who was lost from the
Bates and Cameron clearing for all hint she gave of understanding. He
worked on his supposition, however. He had all the talking to himself.

"You're mighty secret! Now, look at me. I'm no saint, and I've come here
to make a clean breast of that fact. When I was born, Uncle Sam said to
me, 'Cyril P. Harkness, you're a son of mine, and it's your vocation to
worship the God of the Pilgrim Fathers and the Almighty Dollar'; and I
piped up, 'Right you are, uncle.' I was only a baby then." He added
these last words reflectively, as if pondering on the reminiscence, and
gained the object of his foolery--that she spoke.

"If you mean to tell me that you're fond of money, that's no news. I've
had sense to see _that_. If you thought I'd a mine belonging to me
somewhere that accounts for the affection you've been talking of so
much. I _begin_ to _believe_ in it now."