It must be a great deal more settled before we have done with it, as you'll find when you hear what I have to tell you." "What you have to tell me!" said Sir Roger, sitting up in bed; "and what have you to tell me ?" "Your will says you sister's eldest child." "Yes; but that's only in the event of Louis Philippe dying before he is twenty-five." "Exactly; and now I know something about your sister's eldest child, and, therefore, I have come to tell you." "You know something about Mary's eldest child ?" "I do, Scatcherd; it is a strange story, and maybe it will make you angry.

I cannot help it if it does so.

I should not tell you this if I could avoid it; but as I do tell you, for your sake, as you will see, and not for my own, I must implore you not to tell my secret to others." Sir Roger now looked at him with an altered countenance.

There was something in his voice of the authoritative tone of other days, something in the doctor's look which had on the baronet the same effect which in former days it had sometimes had on the stone-mason.
"Can you give me a promise, Scatcherd, that what I am about to tell you shall not be repeated ?" "A promise! Well, I don't know what it's about, you know.

I don't like promises in the dark." "Then I must leave it to your honour; for what I have to say must be said.