His face, and the thought of those faces at home, were too much for Fleda; she could not help it; "Oh, uncle Rolf," she said, hiding her face, "they only want to see you again now!"
Mr. Rossitur leaned his head in his hands and groaned; and Fleda could but cry; she felt there was nothing to say.
"It was for Marion," he said at length;--"it was when I was hard pressed and I was fearful if it were known that it might ruin her prospects.--I wanted that miserable sum--only four thousand dollars--that fellow Schwiden asked to borrow it of me for a few days, and to refuse would have been to confess all. I dared not try my credit, and I just madly took that step that proved irretrievable--I counted at the moment upon funds that were coming to me only the next week, sure, I thought, as possible,--but the man cheated me, and our embarrassments thickened from that time; that thing has been a weight--oh a weight of deadening power!--round my neck ever since. I have died a living death these six years!--"
"I know it, dear uncle--I know it all!" said Fleda, bringing the sympathizing touch of her cheek to his again.
"The good that it did has been unspeakably overbalanced by the evil--even long ago I knew that."
"The good that it did"! It was no time then to moralize, but he must know that Marion was at home, or he might incautiously reveal to her what happily there was no necessity for her ever knowing. And the story must give him great and fresh pain----
"Dear uncle Rolf!" said Fleda pressing closer to him, "we may be happier than we have been in a long time, if you will only take it so. The cloud upon you has been a cloud upon us."
"I know it!" he exclaimed,--"a cloud that served to shew me that my jewels were diamonds!"
"You have an accession to your jewels, uncle Rolf."
"What do you mean?"