Mr.Templeton's second wife was a penniless girl.

She had died two or three years after Cedric's birth, and Dinah, the elder sister, had mothered him.
"You must put a good face on it and write to your sister," continued Malcolm.

"If you take my advice, Templeton, you will keep nothing back--' the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth'-- and hang the consequences." Malcolm finished his sentence with a touch of impatience, for the boy's scared face almost frightened him.
"No, no, no!" returned Cedric vehemently.

"I would sooner drown myself a hundred times over.

Look here," plucking at Malcolm's coat-sleeve with his feverish, restless hand, "you don't understand--you don't know Dinah; she would break her heart, and Elizabeth too.