'Stephen and I are not bad, father,' added Martha, speaking up proudly;
'I am not like Black Bess of Botfield. Mother always told me I was to do
my duty; and I always do it. I can wash, and sew, and iron, and bake, and
knit. Why, often and often we've had no more than Stephen's earnings,
when you've been to the Red Lion on reckoning nights.'

'Hush, hush, Martha!' whispered Stephen.

'No, it's true,' groaned the dying father; 'God Almighty, have mercy on
me! Stephen, hearken to me, and thee too, Martha, while I tell you about
this place, and what you are to do when I'm gone.'

He paused for a minute or two, looking earnestly at the crouching old man
in the chimney-corner.

'Grandfather's quite simple,' he said, 'and he's dark, too, and doesn't
know what any one is saying. But I know thee'lt be good to him, Stephen.
Hearken, children: your poor old grandfather was once in jail, and was
sent across the seas, for a thief.'

'Father!' cried Stephen, in a tone of deep distress; and he turned
quickly to the old man, remembering how often he had sat upon his knees
by the winter fire, and how many summer days he had rambled with him over
the uplands after the sheep. His grandfather had been far kinder to him
than his own father; and his heart swelled with anger as he went and laid
his arm round the bending neck of the old man, who looked up in his face
and laughed heartily.

'Come back, Stephen; it's true,' gasped James Fern. 'Poor mother and me
came here, where nobody knew us, while he was away for more than twenty