“Have you got your pipe smoked out, Uncle Billy?” he asked.

“Yes, lad; I ha’ just finished it.”

“Then are you comin’ to bed now?”

“I thocht to.  Do ye want for anything?”

“Oh, no!  I’m all right.”

The man began to prepare for bed.

After a while Ralph spoke.

“Uncle Billy!”

“What is it, lad?”

“I’ve been thinkin’, s’pose this suit should go against us, do you b’lieve Mrs. Burnham would do anything more for me?”

“She’s a gude woman, Ralph.  Na doot she’d care for ye; but ye could na hope to have her tak’ ye to her hame, an they proved ye waur no’ her son.”

“An’ then—­an’ then I’d stay right along with you, wouldn’t I?”

“I hope so, lad, I hope so.  I want ye s’ould stay wi’ me till ye find a better place.”

“Oh, I couldn’t find a better place to stay, I know I couldn’t, ’xcept with my—­’xcept with Mrs. Burnham.”

“Wull, ye need na worry aboot the matter.  Ye’ll ha’ naught to fear fra the trial, I’m thinkin’.  Gae to sleep noo; ye’ll feel better i’ the mornin’, na doot.”

Ralph was silent, but only for a minute.  A new thought was working slowly into his mind.

“But, Uncle Billy,” he said, “s’pose they should prove, to-morrow, ’at Simon Craft is my own gran’father, would I have to—­Oh!  Uncle Billy!”

The lad started up in bed, sat there for a moment with wildly staring eyes, and then sprang to the floor trembling with excitement and fear.

“Oh, don’t!” he cried; “Uncle Billy, don’t let him take me back there to live with him!  I couldn’t stan’ it!  I couldn’t!  I’d die!  I can’t go, Uncle Billy!  I can’t!”

“There, there, lad! ha’ no fear; ye’ll no’ go back, I’ll no’ let ye.”

The man had Ralph in his arms trying to quiet him.

“But,” persisted the boy, “he’ll come for me, he’ll, make me go.  If they find out I’m his gran’son there at the court, they’ll tell him to take me, I know they will!”

“But ye’re no’ his gran’son, Ralph, ye’ve naught to do wi’ ’im.  Ye’re Robert Burnham’s son.”

“Oh, no, Uncle Billy, I ain’t, I—­” He stopped suddenly.  The certain result of disclosing his knowledge to his Uncle Billy flashed warningly across his mind.  If Bachelor Billy knew it, Mrs. Burnham must know it; if Mrs. Burnham knew it, Goodlaw and the court must know it, the verdict would be against him, Simon Craft would come to take him back to the terrors of his wretched home, and he would have to go.  The law that would deny his claim as Robert Burnham’s son would stamp him as the grandson of Simon Craft, and place him again in his cruel keeping.

Oh, no! he must not tell.  If there were reasons for keeping silence before, they were increased a hundred-fold by the shadow of this last danger.  He felt that he had rather die than go back to live with Simon Craft.

Bachelor Billy was rocking the boy in his arms as he would have rocked a baby.