"O Mother, plead with Aunt not to talk so!" Aunt Martha was trying to stifle the topic on to which her husband had so successfully emptied the vials of Aunt Jael's wrath. He gave her a "you wait till afterwards" glance that told me a good deal, concentrated though I was on this other overshadowing thing.
"I don't know," said my Grandmother, "leave your Aunt be. The child will have to know it some day; and 'tis the truth." She sighed.
"There you are! If a child has the wickedest beast of a man on earth for her father, the sooner she knows it the better, so that she may mend her ways and turn out a bit different herself. She has more than a spice of his ways about her already. She'd best be told every jot and tittle of the whole story. No one's too young to hear the truth. 'Tis your task though, Hannah. You tell her, if you think fit. But not tonight, it's past the child's bed-time. Be off now! To bed!"
I undressed feverishly, that I might be the sooner in bed to go through all I had heard. I recited hymns rapidly to myself so that I should not think at all till I could do so properly and at peace.
Grandmother came in for her nightly prayer.
"Grandmother, is it true? My father. Who is he? What did he do? Tell me, is it true?"
"Yes, my dear."
"Did he do—all those wicked things?"
"Yes, my dear."