George Marvel nodded, and somehow or other, the flat bottle in which he carried his gin obtruded itself unpleasantly upon his notice. It made a bulge in his pocket, and he tried to hide it from Dan, but did not succeed.
"Will you give me leave to speak of certain things in the past, sir, and not consider it a liberty?" asked Dan.
"Say what you like, Dan; I can't consider any thing you say a liberty."
"Ah--then I may speak of another thing presently, which makes us all very unhappy." (George Marvel shifted uneasily upon his chair, and wished he could get rid of the flat bottle which made itself so conspicuous in his breast-pocket.) "We have gone through many changes in our humble life; but for the most part we have been very happy. Do you remember, sir, when father died, how perplexed I was as to how we should live, and how, when every thing seemed to be a failure, and there didn't seem to be a ray of hope, you came to me with twelve pounds four shillings, in a bag, which you had collected for us among the neighbors?" (George Marvel groaned, and thought, "What would the neighbors say to me now if I went to them on such an errand? But I was respected then.") "Well, sir, from that time fortune smiled upon us, and we got on, until the unhappy day came. You know, sir, what father died of; it causes me shame and sorrow to think of, although it is a long time ago. I remember how Ellen and I used to sit here, in this very room, and tremble when we heard his step in the passage--she was frightened, but I was more ashamed than frightened. There was the day poor mother was buried--I shall never forget that night when we sat here in the dark; Mrs. Marvel was very kind to us that day, but indeed she was always that. Jo's mother couldn't be otherwise." (George Marvel gave a gasp, and lowered his head.) "It cuts, sir, to speak of Jo in this way; I feel it as well as you. But it may do good. Now I'll tell you what I thought that night of poor mother's funeral, when I heard father stumbling in the passage. I thought it was cruel and unkind to mother; I thought that even if he had the right to bring shame on himself (which I am certain he hadn't, for no man has), he had no right to bring it on us; I thought that perhaps poor mother died sooner than she might have done if father had been a steady and sober man. For father earned very little money, and mother had to work very hard to make both ends meet. I have known her get up in the winter mornings at five o'clock, and work and slave till near midnight, and all because of father's idleness. Now tell me, sir, you whom I have always looked up to because you are a just man, could any thing justify father in leading the life he did?"
"Nothing, Dan," replied George Marvel, in a low voice.
"He did not even have the excuse of a great grief," said Dan courageously and tenderly. "Why, when he died that dreadful death, shamed and shocked as I was, I looked upon it as a mercy to him and to us that he was taken away. Yet, going a long way back, to the time when I was very young, I remember that father was not so very bad; he used to drink a little, but was not always drunk. It grew upon him, I suppose, until it mastered him, and made him what he became." Certainly, Dan proved himself the cunningest of physicians; he had brought home to George Marvel a consciousness of the abyss towards which he was walking, and had executed his task tenderly, wisely, and without giving offence. "Now, come, sir," continued Dan boldly; "let us look things straight in the face. You said you must go away from here--you mean all of us, of course. Have you any idea where we should move to?"
"None, Dan. Only one thing is plain to me--ay, much plainer to me after what you have said--and that is that I must go from this neighborhood, where once I held up my head and was respected, but where now every man and woman is my enemy. I never will be friends with them again--never! If they held out their hands to me now, I should refuse them after what they have said of our poor dead boy."
"Dead boy!" mused Dan. "Are you certain, sir, that Jo is dead?" So startled was Mr. Marvel by the question, that he gazed at Dan in speechless astonishment. "I haven't spoken of it to anybody else, but something tells me that our Joe is alive. Yes, sir, you may well stare at me, for every other person but you and Ellen and Mrs. Marvel would call me mad for saying such a thing. I can give you no reason for the belief--for it is a belief, not a fancy. Haven't you heard, sir, of men being wrecked on strange lands, and living there for many years after they were supposed to be dead? Haven't you heard of men living amongst savages, and suddenly appearing among their friends years and years after they were lost? Some such thing, happily, may have occurred to Jo."
"But it's two years now since Josh went away," gasped Mr. Marvel; and then added, "Don't tell mother, Dan; it would drive her out of her senses."
"I shall wait before I tell her, but I shall tell Ellen when the proper time comes. Hope isn't a bad thing, sir.