"Yes, Rachel Trant told me. Will you not sit down?"
He drew a chair beside her work-table, and looking at her for a minute exclaimed, in harsh tones which yet showed emotion,
"You are a good woman!"
"How have you found that out?" asked Katherine, smiling.
"I will answer by a long, cruel story!" he returned with a sigh; "a story I would tell to none but you." Again he paused, looking down as if collecting his thoughts, while the brown, bony, sinewy hand he laid on the table was tightly clenched. "You knew my father," he began, suddenly raising his dark suspicious eyes to her, "and therefore can understand what an exacting tyrant he could be to those who were in his power. As a mere child I feared him and shrank from him; my earliest recollection was of my mother's care in keeping me from him. He was not violent to her—I don't suppose he ever struck her, but he treated her with cold contempt, why, I never understood, except that she cost him money, and brought him none. I won't unman myself by describing what her life was, or how passionately I loved her; we clung to each other as desolate, persecuted creatures only do! He grudged us the food we ate, the clothes—rather the rags—we wore. One day playing in Regent's Park I fell into the canal, and was nearly drowned. A gentleman went in after me and saved me. He took me home, he gave me to my mother, he often met us after. He gave me treats and money,—I can't dwell on this time. He won my mother's love, chiefly through me. He was going away to the new world. He persuaded her to leave her wretched home, to take me,—we escaped. I shall never forget the joy of those few days! Then my father (as we might have known he would) put out his torturing hand and seized me. My mother had hoped that his miserly nature would have disposed him to let me go, if he could thereby escape the cost of my maintenance. But revenge was too sweet to be foregone. I was dragged away. He did not want her back. He hoped her lover would desert her after awhile, and so accomplish her punishment; but he was true! No, I can never forget my mother's agony when I was torn from her!" he rose and walked to the window, and returned. "The hideous picture had grown faint," he said, "but as I speak it grows clear and black! You can imagine my life after this! It was well calculated to turn a moody, passionate boy into a devil! I was nearly eleven when I lost my mother, and I never heard of her or from her after; yet I never doubted that she loved me and tried to communicate with me, but my father's infernal spite kept us apart. At sixteen I ran away. Your father was friendly to me and tried to persuade me against what he called rashness; but I always fancied he might have helped my mother, backed her up more, and I did not heed him. I went through a rough training, as you may suppose, and never saw my father's face again."
"I can imagine that he could be terrible," murmured Katherine. "I was dreadfully afraid of him, but I did not know he had been so cruel."
George Liddell did not seem to hear her, he was lost in thought.
"You wonder, I daresay, why I tell you this long story," he resumed; "you will see what it leads up to presently."
"I am greatly interested," returned Katherine.
"You will be more so! From what I told Newton, you know enough of my career in Australia, but you do not know that I married a sweet, delicate woman, who, after the birth of our little Marie, fell into bad health. If I could have taken her away for a long voyage, it might have saved her, but I was in full swing making my pile, and could not tear myself away; that must have been about the time my father died. Had I known I was his heir, I should have sent my wife home. But fool that I was! I was too wrapped up making money (for the tide had just turned, and I was floating to fortune) to see that she was slipping from me. I never dreamed my father would die intestate. I always thought he would take care of his precious gold. It was well for me he destroyed his will."