Clifford was secretly furious at this spiteful thrust; nothing but his respect for the man's age and weakened condition kept him from voicing a scathing retort.
"Miss Heatherford's property will be settled exclusively upon herself before she becomes my wife," he merely replied, with an air of dignity that sat well upon him. "I have no desire to build myself up upon the foundation of another. From my earliest boyhood I have been conscious of something within me that was bound to rise, and if I have my health I have no fear that I shall be able to make for myself a name and position of which neither I nor my friends will be ashamed."
"Humph!" grunted the squire again; but he shot a look at the fine face opposite him that had an unwonted gleam of respect in it.
"You remarked a while ago," Clifford resumed after a moment of silence, "that you believe Mr. Temple is unaware of the fact that he has a son. I am confident you are mistaken. I am quite sure that he knows that I am his son, although he evidently thinks that I am ignorant regarding my relationship to him."
He then described his first meeting with Mr. Temple a few days after Minnie Temple's accident, and how agitated the man had been upon learning of his name and the fact that he had been bound to Squire Talford for four years.
The squire smiled grimly as he concluded:
"Well, it does look as if he had an inkling of the truth, that's a fact," he said, "and he must have had quite a shock at the time—he couldn't have felt over and above easy, I'm thinking, especially since I came to Washington. I don't see that it has done much good telling you this story," he went on moodily, "except that perhaps it has set your mind at rest about your origin. I don't suppose I should ever have told it if it hadn't been for Maria—she was bound that you should know the truth, and, on the whole, I am not sorry it is over with."
Clifford made no reply to these remarks—he felt they called for none—but busied himself with gathering up his papers and replacing them in their box, his companion regarding him curiously while he did so.