"What do you mean?" demanded the squire, with well-assumed surprise.
Maria sniffed significantly and tossed her head.
"I suppose you imagine I don't know who Cliff's father was," she said, with a wise smile. "I suppose you think I never heard that story about Belle Abbot, who, after she was engaged to one man, fell in love with another and jilted the first one. But I never suspected that the man she married was anything to you—I never heard that part of it—until just afore I came to Washington. I was dustin' the books in that old secretary in your bedroom, and came across that old Bible your mother used to like because the type was so clear. I'd seen it a hundred times, but never took any notice of the family record till that day, when I found the same name, among a lot of others, that I saw on Belle Abbot's marriage-certificate.
"You could have knocked me over with a feather, for I always believed Cliff's mother married a man by the name o' Faxon—and she did, too, for that was one of the names. I never could understand afore why you hated the boy so; but now I see through it. You knew he didn't know anything about his father; you pretended to be a friend to Mis' Faxon after she came back from the West, influenced her to bind the boy to you when she was dyin', and managed, some way, to get hold o' them papers and have kep' 'em hid from him ever since, for you didn't mean he should ever have his rights if you could help it."
"Don't you think you are getting pretty sharp and familiar in your talk, Maria?" the squire demanded shortly, as she paused for breath, but the hand that was fingering an envelope trembled visibly.
"Maybe," she coolly retorted. "I'd made up my mind that the right time had come for some 'sharp and familiar' talk to you, and I wasn't going to shirk my duty. I've lived with you, Squire Talford, nigh on to eighteen years, and I've tried to do my best for you and your'n all that time—'specially since Mis' Talford died, for I felt I owed her a lot for the pains she took to train me; then, of course, I wanted to feel that I earned the money you was payin' me, though I've never had a rise in my wages. So my conscience is clear on that score, and I don't think I've neglected anything except to speak my mind, and that I'm goin' to make up for now, if I never set foot in the old place again.
"I've had hard work to hold my tongue in the past when you was abusin' Cliff as you used to, and you'd no cause to hate him as you seemed to, either. He never wronged you; he wasn't to blame for comin' into the world the son o' the other man instead o' your'n. A better, brighter boy never drew breath; he served you faithful as the day was long and you treated him shameful—worse'n a slave. I used to wonder how you could sleep nights after some o' those awful thrashin's you gave him. I never felt meaner in my life for anybody than I did for you when you let him go off to college without even a word o' kindness and encouragement, and if I knew then what I know now he'd never have gone away as empty-handed as he did."
"You are spreading it on pretty thick, Maria, and I think it is about time you stopped," the squire here interposed, and with a face that was now crimson with mingled anger and shame.
"Yes, I s'pose I am spreadin' it on thick," she composedly admitted, "and I tell you I'm downright glad of the chance for once. I reckon I am about through, though, only I'd like to ask what you propose to do for Cliff."
"I'm not sure that I propose to do anything," was the sullen reply.