‘A good deal,’ said Caldigate,—­’as much as may be, with the exception that I was never married to the woman.’

‘I suppose not that.’  Robert Bolton as he spoke was very grave, but did not at first seem disposed to be angry.  ’Had you not better tell me everything, do you think?’

’It is for that purpose that I have come and brought you the letter.  You understand about the money.’

‘I suppose so.’

‘There can be no reason why I should return a penny of it?’

’Certainly not, now.  You certainly must not return it under a threat,—­even though the woman should be starving.  There can be no circumstances—­’ and as he spoke he dashed his hand down upon the table,—­’no circumstances in which a man should allow money to be extorted from him by a threat.  For Hester’s sake you must not do that.’

‘No;—­no; I must not do that, of course.’

‘And now tell me what is true?’ There was something of authority in the tone of his voice, something perhaps of censure, something too of doubt, which went much against the grain with Caldigate.  He had determined to tell his story, feeling that counsel was necessary to him, but he wished so to tell it as to subject himself to no criticism and to admit no fault.  He wanted assistance, but he wanted it on friendly and sympathetic terms.  He had a great dislike to being—­’blown up,’ as he would probably have expressed it himself, and he already thought that he saw in his companion’s eye a tendency that way.  Turning all this in his mind, he paused a moment before he began to tell his tale.  ’You say that a good deal in this woman’s letter is true.  Had you not better tell me what is true?’

‘I was very intimate with her.’

‘Did she ever live with you?’

‘Yes, she did.’

‘As your wife?’

‘Well; yes.  It is of course best that you should know all.’  Then he gave a tolerably true account of all that had happened between himself and Mrs. Smith up to the time at which, as the reader knows, he found her performing at the Sydney theatre.

‘You had made her a distinct promise of marriage on board the ship?’

‘I think I had.’

‘You think?’

’Yes.  I think I did.  Can you not understand that a man may be in great doubt as to the exact words that he may have spoken at such a time?’

‘Hardly.’

’Then I don’t think you realise the man’s position.  I wish to let you know the truth as exactly as I can.  You had better take it for granted that I did make such a promise, though probably no such promise was absolutely uttered.  But I did tell her afterwards that I would marry her.’

‘Afterwards?’

‘Yes, when she followed me up to Ahalala.’

‘Did Richard Shand know her?’

’Of course he did,—­on board the ship;—­and he was with me when she came to Ahalala.’

‘And she lived with you?’