acknowledging her daughter as his grandchild. I hope it will, with all
my heart; I hope so."

"In that case, Sergeant Wilks," Mrs. Walsham said, "let this be her
home for the time. Before you told me your story, I had made up my mind
to ask you to let her remain with me. You need feel under no
obligation, for the money you have paid me is amply sufficient to pay
for the expenses of what she eats for years. It will be a real pleasure
for me to keep her, for she has become a part of the house, and we
should miss her sorely, indeed. She is quick and intelligent, and I
will teach her all I know, and can train her up to take a situation as
a governess in a gentleman's family, or perhaps--" and she laughed,
"your little romance might come true some day, and she can in that case
stop in this home until James makes her another."

"You are very kind, ma'am," the sergeant said. "Truly kind indeed; and
I humbly accept your offer, except that so long as I live she shall be
no expense to you. I earn more than enough for my wants, and can, at
any rate, do something towards preventing her from being altogether a
burden on your hands. And now, ma'am, how would you recommend me to go
to work with the vindictive old man up at the Hall?"

"I shouldn't have thought he was vindictive. That is not at all the
character he bears."

"No," the sergeant said, "I hear him spoken well of; but I have seen,
in other cases, men, who have had the name of being pleasant and
generous, were yet tyrants and brutes in their own family. I judge him
as I found him--a hard hearted, tyrannical, vindictive father. I think
I had better not see him myself. We have never met. I have never set