As for Powys, he was touched, and at the same time alarmed. It was the same subject which occupied them both, but yet they looked upon it with very different eyes. The Canadian knew what was in those scraps of paper with their lines of figures and awful totals, and it seemed to him that sooner than show them to any one, sooner than make a clean breast of what was in them, he would rather die. Yet the kindness went to his heart, and made him in his own eyes a monster. “Divined!” he said half to himself, with a look of horror. If Mr. Brownlow had divined it, it seemed to Powys that he never could hold up his head before him again. Shame would stand between them, or something he thought shame. He had not done much that was wrong, but he could have shrunk into the very ground at the idea that his thoughts and calculations were known. In spite of himself he cast a piteous glance at the whiteness of his elbows--was that how it came about that Mr. Brownlow divined? Pride, shame, gratitude, compunction, surged up in his mind, into his very eyes and throat, so that he could not speak or look at the patron who was so good to him, yet whom he could not yield to. “Sir,” he stammered, when he had got a little command of himself--“you are mistaken. I--I have nothing on my mind--nothing more than every man has who has a--a--life of his own. Indeed, sir,” the poor youth continued with eagerness, “don’t think I am ungrateful--but I--I--_can’t_ tell you. I can’t tell my own mother. It is my own fault. It is nothing to any other creature. In short,” he added, breaking off with an effort, and forcing a smile, “it _is_ nothing--nothing!--only I suppose that I am unaccustomed to the world--” “Sit down,” said Mr. Brownlow; “come nearer to me, and sit down upon this chair. You are very young--” “I am five-and-twenty,” said Powys. He said it hastily, answering what he thought was a kind of accusation; and the words struck the lawyer like a blow. It was not new to him, and yet the very statement of that momentous number seemed to carry a certain significance. The ill-omened fortune which made these two adversaries had come to the one just when the other was born. “Well,” said Mr. Brownlow, who felt his utterance stopped by these innocent words, “it does not matter. Sit down; I have still a great deal to say--”