"But why did my grandfather give away his property like that?" asked the girl.
"'Cause John swore if he didn't do it dat he would carry you off and put you into a foundling asylum. You was a pore, leetle, deliky babby then, and we skeecely 'spected you would live from one day to de nex' one. So to hab de pleasure ob keepin' an' tendin' you de ole man 'sented to beggar hisself."
"Grandpa did all that for my unworthy sake, and yet I reproached him for being strict and hard with me! Oh, how wicked and ungrateful he must think me," cried the girl, tearfully.
"No he don't, honey, chile," said the black woman, soothingly, "you see he knowed dat you wasn't 'ware of all what you had to t'ank him for."
"No, indeed, I never dreamed of all I had cost him," exclaimed beautiful Golden, self-reproachfully. "And so, black mammy, we are only staying at Glenalvan Hall on the sufferance of my uncle?"
"Dat's jest de way ob it, missie. And, look ye, too dat ongrateful, graspin' wilyun has done threaten your pore gran'pa, time and ag'in, to pack bofe of you'uns off to de pore-house."
"The unnatural monster!" exclaimed little Golden, in a perfect tempest of passionate wrath.
"Well you may say so," cried Dinah, in a fever of sympathy. "De debbil will nebber git his due till he gets John Glenalvan! De blood biles in my ole vains when I fink ob all de insults dat man has heaped on his own fader, 'long ob you and your pore misguided mudder."
Beautiful little Golden sat upright regarding the excited old woman in grave silence. Her blue eyes were on fire with indignation and grief. At times she would murmur: "Poor, dear grandpa, dear true-hearted grandpa," and relapse into silence again.
She roused herself at last from her musing mood, and looked up at Dinah. There was a hopeful light in the soft, blue eyes, so lately drowned in tears of sorrow and despair.