This was an accusation which the Squire's son found it very difficult to answer. It could not be answered without a reference to his own birth, and it was almost impossible that he should explain his father's feelings on the subject. "If this were settled, we should be glad that you would come," he said. "Yes," said Ralph the heir; "yes,--if I consented to give up everything that is mine by right. Do you think that a fellow can bring himself to abandon all that so easily? It's like tearing a fellow's heart out of him. If I'll do that, my uncle will let me come and see what it is that I have lost! That which would induce him to welcome me would make it impossible that I should go there. It may be that I shall sell it. I suppose I shall. But I will never look at it afterwards." As it came to this point, the tears were streaming down his cheeks, and the eyes of the other Ralph were not dry. "I wish it could be made pleasant for us all," said the Squire's son. The wish was well enough, but the expression of it was hardly needed, because it must be so general. "But all this is rot and nonsense," said Ralph the heir, brushing the tears away from his eyes, "and I am only making an ass of myself. Your father wants to know whether I will sell the reversion to Newton Priory. I will. I find I must. I don't know whether I wouldn't sooner cut my throat; but unless I cut my throat I must sell it. I had a means of escape, but that has gone by. When I wrote that letter there was a means of escape. Now there's none." "Ralph," said the other. "Well; speak on. I've about said all I've got to say. Only don't think I want to ballyrag about the money. That's right enough, no doubt. If there's more to come, the people that have to look to it will say so. I'm not going to be a Jew about it." "Ralph; I wouldn't do anything in a hurry. I won't take your answer in a hurry like this." "It's no good, my dear fellow, I must do it. I must have L5,000 at once." "You can get that from an insurance office." "And then I should have nothing to live on. I must do it. I have no way out of it,--except cutting my throat." The Squire's son paused a moment, thinking. "I was told by my father," said he, "to offer you more money." "If it's worth more the people will say so," said Ralph the heir, impetuously; "I do not want to sell it for more than it's worth. Ask them to settle it immediately. There are people I must pay money to at once."