r, but when it come to
running away I began to take another turn for the worse.

"The lovers" says Jemmy "fled to London and were united at the altar of
Saint Clement's Danes. And it is at this period of their simple but
touching story that we find them inmates of the dwelling of a
highly-respected and beloved lady of the name of Gran, residing within a
hundred miles of Norfolk Street."

I felt that we were almost safe now, I felt that the dear boy had no
suspicion of the bitter truth, and I looked at the Major for the first
time and drew a long breath. The Major gave me a nod.

"Our hero's father" Jemmy goes on "proving implacable and carrying his
threat into unrelenting execution, the struggles of the young couple in
London were severe, and would have been far more so, but for their good
angel's having conducted them to the abode of Mrs. Gran; who, divining
their poverty (in spite of their endeavours to conceal it from her), by a
thousand delicate arts smoothed their rough way, and alleviated the
sharpness of their first distress."

Here Jemmy took one of my hands in one of his, and began a marking the
turns of his story by making me give a beat from time to time upon his
other hand.

"After a while, they left the house of Mrs. Gran, and pursued their
fortunes through a variety of successes and failures elsewhere. But in
all reverses, whether for good or evil, the words of Mr. Edson to the
fair young partner of his life were, 'Unchanging Love and Truth will
carry us through all!'"

My hand trembled in the dear boy's, those words were so wofully unlike
the fact.

"Unchanging Love and Truth" says Jemmy over again, as if he had a proud
kind of a noble pleasure in it, "will carry us through all! Those were
his words. And so they fought their way, poor but gallant and happy,
until Mrs. Edson gave birth to a child."

"A daughter," I says.

"No," says Jemmy, "a son. And the father was so proud of it that he
could hardly bear it out of his sight. But a dark cloud overspread the
scene. Mrs. Edson sickened, drooped, and died."

"Ah! Sickened, drooped, and died!" I says.

"And so Mr. Edson's only comfort, only hope on earth, and only stimulus
to action, was his darling boy. As the child grew older, he grew so like
his mother that he was her living picture. It used to make him wonder
why his father cried when he kissed him. But unhappily he was like his
mother in constitution as well as in face, and lo,