"I am sorry you have suffered such a fright on my account, Mrs. Culpepper," said Smeaton, in a kindly tone; "but I can assure you now, as I did before, that there was nothing to fear on my account." The old lady seemed hardly to attend to him; and the state of agitation displayed by so very calm and demure a person set Smeaton's fancy busy with fears for Emmeline. "I dare say not, sir--I dare say not," she said, with quick but faltering accents. "They came looking for the Earl of Eskdale, and your name is Smeaton. And yet," she continued, gazing in his face, "and yet--Will you be kind enough, sir, to let me look at your wrist?" "I have no objection at all," returned Smeaton, a good deal surprised. "But what can my wrist have to do with this business?" "I will tell you in a minute, sir; I will tell you in a minute," replied the old woman. "Your right wrist, if you please." Smeaton drew up the sleeve of his coat as far as it would go, unfastened the studs which held it together just above the ruffles, and, baring his arm, held it out to her. The old woman took his hand in hers, and, holding his arm near to the candle, leaned her head over it. A large irregular scar appeared some two or three inches above the hand. The young nobleman had often remarked it, but had no recollection how it came there; and now, to his great surprise, he found warm drops falling upon it from the old woman's eyes. The next instant she kissed them away, with an eagerness quite extraordinary; and then, looking up in his face, with the tears still upon her cheeks, she exclaimed-- "Oh, yes, Henry, oh, yes, my lord! I know you now. That mark cost me the bitterest hours that ever I knew in my life." "Pray explain," said Smeaton. "I do not at all understand what you mean, nor know how the scar came there." "I will--I will," she sobbed, wiping her eyes. "Often have you sat on these old knees. Often have you clung with your arms round this old neck. I was your nurse, my lord, from the time you were taken from the breast till you were five years old. You were my nursling, my pet, my darling. It seemed as if God had sent you to me to console me for my own child I had lost; and I loved you as few mothers ever loved a child. "I recollect my nurse Nanny, very well," said Smeaton. "Can you be she?"