We averted it, thank Heaven, and his poor wife will never know.

My boy is dead.

No public investigation into motives would bring him back to life again." I murmured words of condolence.
"He must have been out of his mind, poor lad, when he induced the girl to run away with him.

But, as my son has ruined her," he set his teeth as if the boy's sin stabbed him, "I must look after her welfare." "You may set your mind at rest on that point," said I."He smuggled her at once aboard the ship, and seems scarcely to have said how d'ye do to her afterwards.

That is the mad part of it." "Can I be sure ?" "I would stake my life on it," said I.
"How do you know ?" "Frankness--I may say embarrassing frankness is one of the young lady's drawbacks." He looked greatly relieved.