At this Edith smiled. Wiggins now seemed too methodical for a madman, and she began to understand that he was assuming these solemn airs, so as to make an impression upon her. Having made up her mind to this, she determined to question him further, so as to see what more he proposed to do. “Your father,” said Wiggins, “was my friend; and I will do for you whatever I would have done for him.” “I have no doubt of that,” said Edith. “Indeed, you are doing for me now precisely what I have reason to understand you did for him.” “I do not comprehend you,” said Wiggins. “It is of no consequence,” said Edith. “We will let it pass. Let us return to the subject. You assert that you are my guardian. Does that give you the right to be my jailer--to confine me here, to cut me off from all my friends?” “You use harsh words,” said Wiggins; “but nevertheless it is a fact that the law does allow the guardian this power. It regards him in the place of a parent. All that a father can do, a guardian can do. As a father can restrain a child, so can a guardian, if he deems such restraint necessary. Moreover, if the ward should escape, the law will hand him back to his guardian, just as it would hand, back a child to its father.” Not one word of this did Edith believe, and so it made no impression. Having already got the idea in her mind that Wiggins was melodramatic, and playing a part, she had no doubt that his words would be regulated by the same desire that governed his acts, and would be spoken exclusively with the view of producing an impression upon herself. She therefore looked at him with unchanged feelings, and instantly replied: “It would be very fortunate for you if it were so, but for my part I think better of the law. At the same time, since you claim all this authority over me, I should like to know how long you think this power will last. You do not seem to think that I am of age.” “That matters not,” said Wiggins. “My control over the estates and, my guardianship over you are of such a nature that they can not cease till your marriage.” “Oh, then,” said Edith, “according to that, I ought to try to get married as soon as possible. And this, I suppose, is your sole reason for shutting me up?” Wiggins said nothing, but sat looking gloomily at her. By his last words Edith now found what appeared to her a clew to his whole plan. He was, or pretended to be, her guardian; he had been appointed, or pretended to have been appointed, by her father. It might have been so. Edith could well imagine how in previous years he had made this false friend his executor and the guardian of his child; and then, in the anguish of the trial and of the punishment, forgotten to annul the deed; or Wiggins may have forged the document himself. If he really was the false friend who had betrayed her father, and who had committed that forgery for which her father innocently suffered, then he might easily forge such a document as this in her father's name.