They were no sooner seated on the rude bench than Ralph began:—
"I ought to 'a' told you before, I done very wrong not to tell you, but I couldn't raise the courage to do it till this mornin'. Here's what I want you to know."
Then Ralph told, with full detail, of his visit to Sharpman's office on Sunday evening, of what he had heard there, of his subsequent journey through the streets of the city, of his night of agony, of his morning of shame, of his final victory over himself.
Bachelor Billy listened with intense interest, and when he had heard the boy's story to the end he dashed the tears from his eyes and said: "Gie's your han' Ralph; gie's your twa han's! Ye're a braw lad. Son or no son o' Robert Burnham, ye're fit to stan' ony day in his shoes!"
He was looking down with strong admiration into the boy's pale face, holding the small hands affectionately in both of his.
"I come just as quick as I could," continued the boy, "after I got over thinkin' I'd keep still about it, just as quick as I could, to tell you an' ask you what to do. I'll do anything 'at you tell me it's right to do, Uncle Billy, anything. If you'll only say I must do it, I will. But it's awful hard to do it all alone, to let 'em know who I am, to give up everything so, an' not to have any mother any more, nor no sister, nor no home, nor no learnin', nor nothing; not anything at all, never, any more; it's terrible! Oh, Uncle Billy, it's terrible!"
Then, for the first time since the dreadful words of Rhyming Joe fell on his ears in the darkness of Sharpman's office, Ralph gave way to tears. He wept till his whole frame shook with the deep force of his sobs.
Bachelor Billy put his arm around the boy and drew him to his side. He smoothed back the tangled hair from the child's hot forehead and spoke rude words of comfort into his ears, and after a time Ralph grew quiet.
"Do you think, Uncle Billy," asked Ralph, "'at Rhymin' Joe was a-tellin' the truth? He used to lie, I know he did, I've heard 'im lie myself."
"It looks verra like, Ralph, as though he might 'a' been a-tellin' o' the truth; he must 'a' been knowin' to it all, or he could na tell it so plain."