Will felt something like an electric shock. He was already in a state

of keen sensitiveness and hardly allayed agitation on the subject of

ties in the past, and his presentiments were not agreeable. It seemed

like the fluctuations of a dream--as if the action begun by that loud

bloated stranger were being carried on by this pale-eyed sickly looking

piece of respectability, whose subdued tone and glib formality of

speech were at this moment almost as repulsive to him as their

remembered contrast. He answered, with a marked change of color--

"No, indeed, nothing."

"You see before you, Mr. Ladislaw, a man who is deeply stricken. But

for the urgency of conscience and the knowledge that I am before the

bar of One who seeth not as man seeth, I should be under no compulsion

to make the disclosure which has been my object in asking you to come

here to-night. So far as human laws go, you have no claim on me

whatever."

Will was even more uncomfortable than wondering. Mr. Bulstrode had

paused, leaning his head on his hand, and looking at the floor. But he

now fixed his examining glance on Will and said--

"I am told that your mother's name was Sarah Dunkirk, and that she ran

away from her friends to go on the stage. Also, that your father was

at one time much emaciated by illness. May I ask if you can confirm

these statements?"

"Yes, they are all true," said Will, struck with the order in which an

inquiry had come, that might have been expected to be preliminary to

the banker's previous hints. But Mr. Bulstrode had to-night followed

the order of his emotions; he entertained no doubt that the opportunity

for restitution had come, and he had an overpowering impulse towards

the penitential expression by which he was deprecating chastisement.

"Do you know any particulars of your mother's family?" he continued.

"No; she never liked to speak of them. She was a very generous,

honorable woman," said Will, almost angrily.

"I do not wish to allege anything against her. Did she never mention

her mother to you at all?"

"I have heard her say that she thought her mother did not know the

reason of her running away. She said 'poor mother' in a pitying tone."

"That mother became my wife," said Bulstrode, and then paused a moment

before he added, "you have a claim on me, Mr. Ladislaw: as I said

before, not a legal claim, but one which my conscience recognizes. I

was enriched by that marriage--a result which would probably not have

taken place--certainly not to the same extent--if your grandmother

could have discovered her daughter. That daughter, I gather, is no

longer living!"




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