ot like to do it, for fear you would
think me extravagant and wonder what I did with so much. Not a penny you
gave us ever went into the box. That was my matter, not yours; and I
have worked so hard to do it, for father was not able to look after the
farm, which of itself is poor and barren, and as he was only willing to
hire a boy, I have done a man's work myself at times."

"You, Hannah--you?" Burton said, gazing at the pale-faced, frail-looking
woman, who had done the work of a man rather than ask money of him who
sometimes spent more on one large party than she did in a whole year,
and who said to him, with a sad smile:

"Yes; I have spaded the garden, and planted the corn in the field back
of the hill, where no one could see me, and have helped Sam get in the
hay, though I never attempted to mow; but I did lay up a bit of stone
wall which had tumbled down, I have done what I could."

Poor Hannah! No wonder that her hands, once so small and shapely, were
broad, and hard, and rough, and not much like Mrs. Geraldine's, on which
there were diamonds enough to more than liquidate the debt due to
Elizabeth Rogers and her heirs; and no wonder that her dress, which so
often offended her brother's artistic and critical eye, was coarse, and
plain, and selected with a view to durability rather than comeliness.
She had done what she could, and what few women would have done, and
Burton knew it, and was conscious of a great feeling of respect and
pity, if not affection, for her, as she stood before him in a stooping
posture, with her toil-worn hands clasped together as if asking his
pardon for having intruded her own joyless life upon his notice. But
above every other feeling in his heart was the horrible fear of
exposure if she attempted restitution, and he said to her at last:

"I am sorry for you, Hannah, and I can understand how, with your extreme
conscientiousness, you believed it your duty to do as you have done. But
this must go no further. To discover Elizabeth Rogers is to confess
ourselves the children of a murderer, and this I cannot allow. You have
no right to visit father's sin upon Grey, who would be sure to find it
out if you stirred in the matter. He is sensitive, very, and proud of
his name. It would kill him to know what we do."

"No, brother, it would hurt him, but not kill him." Hannah said, with
energy; "and ever since he was a little child I have depended upon him
to comfort me, to help me, as I knew he