"And you never doubted my honesty?"
"No, never."
That was all that passed between them.
When he had gone Mr. Munroe remarked, "A wonderful young man that; I never in my life met with a more remarkable case. How the young fellow has managed to bear up and fight the world as he has is beyond my comprehension."
"And he has the bearing of a gentleman too," remarked Miss Munroe. "I expected we were going to be highly amused at his behaviour and his dialect, and so on; but really he speaks quite correctly."
"He always was a well-behaved boy," remarked Eva; "and during the time he was in pa's office he told one of the clerks that he was very anxious to speak correctly."
"He must have worked very hard, however," said Mr. Munroe; "and a lad with such application, pluck, and determination is sure to get on. I confess I shall watch his future career with great interest."
"But what surprises me most," said Mrs. Munroe, "is the sterling honesty that seems always to have characterized him. As a rule, those street Arabs have the crudest notions of right and wrong."
"He told me once," said Eva, "that he could just remember his mother, who told him to be honest, and truthful, and good; but his little sister Nelly, who died just before I met him, seems to have been his safeguard, and but for her he said he felt certain he should have been a thief."
Meanwhile the subject of this conversation was making his way along the silent lanes that lay between Brooklands and Scout Farm like one in a dream. Could it be really true, he mused, that he had seen his angel face to face, that he had listened again while she sang "Love at Home," and that he had heard from her own lips how the lost bank-note had been found, and how that now no stain rested upon his name? What a wonderful day it had been! Could it be possible that his long-buried hopes might be realized at last?