Frances did not say anything. The water came into her eyes. Her heart beat loudly, yet softly, against her young bosom. She had known it, so that she was not surprised. The surprise had been broken by Constance’s careless talk, by the wonder, the doubt, the sense of impossibility, which had gradually yielded to a conviction that it must be so. Her feeling was that she would like to go now, without delay, without asking any more questions, to her mother. Her mother! and he hadn’t thought before how much that meant to a girl--of her age! Mr Waring was a little disconcerted by having no answer. Of course it meant a great deal to a girl; but still, not so much as to make her incapable of reply. He felt a little annoyed, disturbed, perhaps jealous, as Frances herself had been. It was with difficulty that he resumed again; but it had to be done. “Your mother and I,” he said, taking up the books again, opening and shutting them, looking at the title-page now of one, now of another, “did not get on very well. I don’t know who was in fault--probably both. She had been married before. She had a son whom you hear Constance speak of as Markham. Markham has been at the bottom of all the trouble. He drove me out of my senses when he was a boy. Now he is a man: so far as I can make out it is he that has disturbed our peace again--hunted us up, and sent Constance here. If you ever meet Markham--and of course now you are sure to meet him--beware of him.” Here he made a pause again, and looked with great seriousness at the book in his hand, turning the leaf to finish a sentence which was continued on the next page. “I beg your pardon, papa,” said Frances; “I am afraid I am very stupid. What relation is Markham to me?” He looked at her for a moment, then threw down the book with some violence on the table, as if it were the offender. “He is your step-brother,” he said. “My--brother? Then I have a brother too?” After a little pause she added, “It is very wonderful, papa, to come into a new world like this all at once. I want--to draw my breath.” “It is my fault that it comes upon you all at once. I never thought---- You were a very small child when I brought you away. You forgot them all, as was natural. I did not at first know how entirely a child forgets; and then--then it seemed a pity to disturb your mind, and perhaps set you longing for--what it was impossible for you to obtain.”