That is one of my mistakes, and I never repented it more deeply than I do now.

Your father and I had a trouble once, and I thought I could never forgive him; so I kept away for years.

Thank God, we made it all up the last time I saw him, and he told me then, that if he was forced to leave her he should bequeath his little girl to me as a token of his love.

I can't fill his place, but I shall try to be a father to her; and if she learns to love me half as well as she did the good one she has lost, I shall be a proud and happy man.

Will she believe this and try ?" Something in Uncle Alec's face touched Rose to the heart, and when he held out his hand with that anxious troubled look in his eyes, she was moved to put up her innocent lips and seal the contract with a confiding kiss.