I did not know then what the motive was for your silence and distress.

I know now, and I love you better after that knowledge than I did before it." Her head dropped into its former position on my bosom, and she murmured a few words, but too faintly for me to hear them.
"You knew more about your father, then, than I did ?" I whispered.
"Less than you have told me since," she interposed quickly, without raising her face.
"Enough to convince you that he was breaking the laws," I suggested; "and, to make you, as his daughter, shrink from saying 'yes' to me when we sat together on the river bank ?" She did not answer.

One of her arms, which was hanging over my shoulder, stole round my neck, and clasped it gently.
"Since that time," I went on, "your father has compromised me.

I am in some danger, not much, from the law.

I have no prospects that are not of the most doubtful kind; and I have no excuse for asking you to share them, except that I have fallen into my present misfortune through trying to discover the obstacle that kept us apart.