“I know something of your history, and partly the reason why you are confined here, and I sorrow every day I live that I cannot in some way be the means of liberating the unfortunate ones who are so often brought here. But I am only a weak woman, and can do but very little against so many wicked men.” Robert thought that she was a very, very beautiful woman, if she was weak; almost as lovely as Dora. “I told you,” she continued, “that I have no other home. My mother is dead. My father I never saw, as he deserted his wife before I was born. My uncles, who were once rich and prosperous, have spent all their wealth in trying to hunt down the man who so deeply wronged their sister; and when she died they took me, a poor little orphan, brought me up and educated me, suffering every privation that I might not be denied any dainty or luxury. “Finally their last dollar was spent, and in their desperation they joined this band of smugglers, and while on some business for the gang in the United States they discovered my father. “They watched and dogged his every step until he came to this country, and are now waiting for a favorable opportunity to wreak their vengeance upon him, and claim my rights, after which they have promised me they will forever renounce this wicked business.” “You say the man, who is your father, is now in this country,” said Robert, as he paused for a moment. “Yes, in the country and in this very village, though why he is here, I do not know, unless a righteous Providence has driven him here to compel him to do justice to the wronged.” A shade of sadness clouded her fair brow, and a deep sigh broke from her lips. “Will you tell me this unnatural father’s name?” asked Robert. “Ralph Moulton.” “Ralph Moulton!” exclaimed Robert, wildly. “Which—who—what—pardon me, I am so taken by surprise. But will you please tell me in what part of the United States your uncles found him?” Our hero leaned breathlessly forward, awaiting her reply. “In S——, Massachusetts,” she answered, glancing up in gentle surprise. “The same—the very same. How exceedingly strange!” he replied, starting to his feet and pacing back and forth. “Do you know this man, who, I am told, is my father?” “Know him?” replied Robert, bitterly. “I know him as an enemy—as my father’s bitterest enemy; and I begin to feel convinced that he is concerned in that plot against me. Yes, yes; I see it all now—fool that I have been, not to think of it before!” He struck his hand violently against his brow as he recalled what the chief had told him—about his father’s unlawful marriage, and his being an illegitimate son. Then his mind went far back to the day when he and Dora went to the squire to be married; his questions and emotion concerning his mother; and he realized at once that there was a deep and vile plot on foot to destroy him.