Sidney had as good as forgotten that there was anything unusual in his friend’s circumstances; this last day or two he had thought of nothing but Jane and his love for her. Now he recalled the anticipation—originating he scarcely knew how—that some kind of disclosure would before long be made to him. The trouble of his mind was heightened; he waited with all but dread for the next words.
“I think I’ve told you,” Michael resumed at length, steadying his voice, “that Joseph is my youngest son, and that I had three others. Three others: Michael, Edward, and Robert,—all dead. Edward died when he was a boy of fifteen; Robert was killed on the railway—he was a porter—at three-and-twenty. The eldest went out to Australia; he took a wife there, and had one child; the wife died when they’d been married a year or two, and Michael and his boy were drowned, both together. I was living with them at the time, as you know. But what I’ve never spoken of, Sidney, is that my son had made his fortune. He left a deal of land, and many thousands of
