"And does he know all this?" he asked. Then, in reply to Neil's nod, he added: "No wonder he would not let you marry his daughter!"
"No wonder," said the young man, bitterly. "Touch pitch and defile yourself; but it was not he who stopped the marriage--it was myself. I would rather die than marry. See what I am--a mass of nerves; think of the terrible history of my parents. Then imagine me asking any woman to share my misery! Well, now that you know all, what do you say?"
Heron looked rather helplessly at him. "What can I say?" he remarked, hesitatingly. "It seems that your mother murdered your father under great provocation, and is now in prison. Well, I think it would be best for you to put the matter out of your head, and go abroad. It is not the slightest use you seeing her."
"I have already done so," Neil said, quietly.
Geoffrey started from his seat. "You visited her in prison?" he asked
"Yes; I learnt where she was from Mr. Cass, and I went to see her at once. For I loved my mother, as much as I hated my father. Poor mother! Her hair is white now, and her fact lined; but she was mad with joy at first on seeing me, and then very angry."
"Why was she angry?"
"Ah, that is the strangest part of the whole affair! I am now going to tell you something that no one else knows--not even Mr. Cass."
"Fire ahead!"
"When I went to the prison," Neil continued, "I did not believe that my mother was guilty. Cass had told me she was but I did not agree with him. Only from her own lips would I learn the truth, and to the prison I went in order to learn it. I saw the governor, and asked to see Mrs. Jenner, but did not give my real name; I merely said that I was a distant relative of hers, and wanted an interview. Well, I saw her--alone."