“It is neither poaching nor quarrelling,” she said. “I can manage the village. There are other things. Father, though we have been quiet for so many years, it is not because there has been nothing to think of--no seeds of trouble in the past--no anxieties----” “I don’t know what you are thinking of,” he said, pettishly. “No anxieties? A man has them as long as he is in the world. We are mortal. Seeds of trouble? I have told you, Mary, that you may spare me general remarks.” “Oh, nothing was further from my mind than general remarks,” she cried. “I don’t know how to speak. Father--look here--read it; it will tell its own story best. This is what, after the silence of years, I have received to-day.” “The silence of years!” said the Squire. He had to fumble for his spectacles, which he had taken off, though he carefully restrained himself from betraying any special interest. A red colour had mounted to his face. Perhaps his mind did not go so far as to divine what it was; but still a sudden glimmering, like the tremble of pale light before the dawn, had come into his mind. And this was the thunderbolt that suddenly fell upon him in his quietness after the silence of years:-- “My dear Sister Mary,--This will be given to you by my little daughter Lilias. The sight of my handwriting and of the children will be enough to startle you, so that I need not try to soften the shock which you must have already received. I claim from my father shelter for my children. Their mother is dead; so are the others of my family whose very names will never be known to my nearest relations. Never mind that now. I am a man both sick and sorry, worn by the world, lonely, and not much better than an adventurer. These children are the last of our race, and the boy, however reluctant you may be, is my father’s heir. I claim for them the shelter of the family roof. I have no home to give them, nor can I give them the care they require. Mary, you are a good woman: you are blameless one way or another. I charge you with my children. God do so to you and more also, according as you deal with them. Some time or other before I die I will drag myself home. That you may be sure of, unless God cuts short my life by the way, of which, if He will, I shall not complain. “Your brother, “JOHN MUSGRAVE.”