had been assailed in his cherished respectability, his self-esteem.
Assailed and _scarred_. How broad and deep the scar was Jabez never told
the world, which as a rule does not sympathise with such scars, but turns
aside in its cruel indifference. The world had almost forgotten the scar
now, and supposed Clerk Gum had done the same. It was all over and done
with years ago.

Jabez Gum's wife--to whom you will shortly have the honour of an
introduction, but she is in her bedroom just now--had borne him one
child, and only one. How this boy was loved, how tenderly reared, let
Calne tell you. Mrs. Gum had to endure no inconsiderable amount of
ridicule at the time from her gossiping friends, who gave Willy sundry
endearing names, applied in derision. Certainly, if any mother ever was
bound up in a child, Mrs. Gum was in hers. The boy was well brought up. A
good education was given him; and at the age of sixteen he went to London
and to fortune. The one was looked upon as a natural sequence to the
other. Some friend of Jabez Gum's had interested himself to procure the
lad's admission into one of the great banks as a junior clerk. He might
rise in time to be cashier, manager, even partner; who knew? Who knew
indeed? And Clerk Gum congratulated himself, and was more respectable
than ever.

Better that Willy Gum had remained at Calne! And yet, and again--who
knew? When the propensity for ill-doing exists it is sure to come out, no
matter where. There were some people in Calne who could have told Clerk
Gum, even then, that Willy, for his age, was tolerably fast and forward.
Mrs. Gum had heard of one or two things that had caused her hair to rise
on end with horror; ay, and with apprehension; but, foolish mother that
she was, not a syllable did she breathe to the clerk; and no one else
ventured to tell him.