"I have, indeed; but people say I brought them on myself."
"That, even if true, does not lighten them."
"No," he replied, with his slow, grave smile; "that is true; but it hinders sympathy, I find. You know, perhaps, that I began life as an apprentice in a great military outfitting shop in London? I was hard-working and careful, and got on well. I set up for myself when I married, as my wife had a little money, and I had saved. I prospered greatly. My business grew and grew; I was soon a rich man. I had the best wife, madam, that ever man was blessed with, and a fine boy—only the one child. I said I would make a gentleman of him. I gave him every advantage—I never said No to him—I—"
His voice trembled, and he was silent for a minute.
"Madam, I find that I cannot speak much of him, even now. I do not believe he ever knew what he was to me. I ruined him by over-indulgence—letting him have too much money; and then, when I began to fear he was going astray, I pulled him up too short. Then—I see it now—I went as much too far the other way—would give him no money, and wanted to part him from all his acquaintance, because I thought they helped to make him idle. He was idle—that I know—but he was good and affectionate until—Well, he rebelled; got into debt; borrowed money right and left. My business went down, for I was forced to make my customers pay up their bills, and that makes discomfort. People naturally go where they get credit. All went wrong with me; and my poor Annie took the boy's misdoing so much to heart that she lost her health."
"Poor thing—oh, poor mother!" whispered May.
"The boy went from bad to worse. At last—I never told this to mortal before except my poor Annie, and she guessed it. I had a large sum of money coming to me, and I depended on it, as I had a great payment to make. He knew it; he went the day before I was to receive it, and got it, saying I had a sudden need for it, and had sent him. And then he disappeared. I concealed his—theft—from every one except my wife—she guessed it, and it finished what his wild doings had begun. She never held her head up again, madam. She pined away, longing for her boy, that she might try to bring him to a sense of his faults; but he never came. I put advertisements in the paper, begging him to come home, and that all should be forgiven; but he never saw them. He was abroad, I believe. At last—she died; and the night before her funeral, Fred, knowing nothing of this, came home. He came in on me suddenly, and I had no heart to speak. He said he had seen the advertisement at last, and had come home to confess that he was married,—and he told me who the girl was. A good girl, I believe; but she belonged to bad people—low, dishonest folk, in a small way of trade—and my heart rose up against the thought of her bearing my Annie's name, and she lying in her coffin. I got up—" Ralph straightened himself and spoke louder, "I opened the door; I said, 'Your mother lies dead upstairs, murdered by you. You have brought her to the grave, and me to ruin. Go to the wife you have chosen—never let me see your face again.'"
"Oh, Mr. Trulock! Surely he did not take you at your word? Surely he saw that you were speaking wildly?"
"He had his faults, madam, but want of affection was never one of them. He tried again and again—he both wrote and came to the house; but I would neither see him nor read his letters. I was mad, I think; mad with sorrow and anger. At last he got a friend to trick me into reading one letter, the last he ever wrote to me. He said he saw that I could not forgive him, although he hoped I would believe that he had not meant to leave his mother to die without seeing him; that he was going to emigrate, and that he would repay the money he had taken from me as soon as he could. I have never heard of him since—not a word."
"He will come yet," said May; but Trulock shook his head.