"Unfortunately, Mr. Haveril, we have to belong to the world. I assure you that I would much rather not." "You've got to. However, we did go on; I have not told the person chiefly interested all I'd heard about you, nor the half. We've now brought our business to an end. That is, we've proved up to the hilt what was at first only a suspicion." "Again, I dare say I shall understand you presently." "The question is, whether you know the secret. 'If,' I said, 'he does know the secret, and still carries on the pretence, the chap isn't worthy of our notice. Let's wipe our feet on him, and go on our way.'" "Wipe--your--feet? You like plain and straightforward things, Mr. Haveril. Surely it is a poetical and an imaginative case--'wipe your feet'--upon--a--'chap.'" "'If he carries on the pretence in ignorance,' I said, 'let us tell him, and see how he takes it. If he takes it worthily, we shall know what to think of him.'" "To think of him?" murmured Humphrey. "Yes. Well, the time has come for you to learn the truth, if you don't know the truth already." Humphrey smiled. "I really cannot read that riddle. No; I do not know the truth. Whether I shall take it worthily, as you say, or whether I shall receive the wiping of muddy feet, I cannot foretell." "You don't know? Well, I don't think it's my business to tell you. Very likely some one will tell you. Meantime, the person principally concerned does know it, and you will understand, when you do learn the truth, how much it has unsettled her. Also Dick knows it." "Who is Dick? Fiddler Dick? Dick the Tramp? Dick who goes out in white-thread gloves, like a waiter?" "And Molly knows it. And I know it. Very well. Now, I want you to remember very carefully what I say. If you don't understand these words now, you will later on. First of all, whatever happens, you are no relation of mine." "Thank you! thank you!" Humphrey changed his position, sat up, and clasped his hands. "Thank you, _so_ much! I began to fear, Mr. Haveril, that you must be a long-lost uncle." "And no claim can be set up on me. You are not my son, but hers." "That is at least true. I am hers. And I certainly am not yours. This grows exciting." "Hers, I say, not mine." Humphrey jumped in his chair. "How the devil, man, can I be your son? What drivel is this?" John Haveril paid no attention to this question. He was putting his own case in his own words. "And not being my son, there's no claim," he went on slowly. "But, young man, as the thing has to come out, you will have to behave according." "'Behave according'? Come, Mr. Haveril, I have given you a patient hearing. Pray, what do you mean by 'behave according'? But please--please tell me what you mean, or go away." He spread his hands helplessly. "I wish some one would come," he murmured, "and carry off this person."