"Vernon, I recall a time, it comes back to me. I went unexpectedly into a room where my father and stepmother were seated. I saw my darling father in a rage, one of the few rages I have seen him in since his marriage. I heard him say to her: 'Your brother will not enter this house!' Can he be the same man?" "Beyond doubt he is. Well, now, I will tell you that when I first knew you I also knew, as did most people who were acquainted with your father, something of his story. I knew that he had gone through a time of terrible punishment; that he had been cashiered; that he was supposed to have committed a very heinous crime--in short, that he was the sort of person whom no upright soldier would speak to." "Yes," I said, trembling very much; "that is what one would think, that is what I said in my letter. Only you understand, Vernon, that I am on his side--he and I bear the same shame." "Little darling, not a bit of it. There's no shame for you to bear. But let me go on. You remember that day when I met you in Hyde Park?" "_The_ day?" I said. "_The_ day, Heather. You and I walked back to the house in Hanbury Square together. You were sent out of the room. I had a long talk with your stepmother and with your father--no matter now what was said. I was beside myself for a time, but I made up my mind then that whatever happened I'd woo you and win you and get you and keep you! Something else also haunted me, and that was the fact that your father, Major Grayson, was not in the least like the sort of man I had expected him to be. I have, Heather, I believe, the power of reading character, and if ever there was a man who had a perfectly beautiful, honourable expression, if ever there was a man who could _not_ do the sort of thing which Major Grayson had been accused of doing, that man was your father. Before I left the house I was as certain of his innocence as I was of my own." "You darling!" I said. I stooped and kissed his hand. "Then I thought of you, and I said to myself: 'She's Major Grayson's worthy daughter,' and--I gave myself up to thinking out this thing. People can go to the British Museum, Heather, and can read the newspapers of any date, so I went there on the following morning and read up the whole of your father's trial. I read the evidence for and against him, and I discovered that there was a great deal of talk about a Gideon Dalrymple--the Honourable Gideon Dalrymple, as he was called. He was mixed up in the thing. I went farther into particulars, and discovered that this man was the brother of Lady Helen. I sat and thought over that fact for a long time. I took it home to my rooms with me and thought it over there; I thought it over and over and over, but I could not see daylight, only I was more and more certain that your father was innocent.