Chapter 15.

    "It may be under palace roof,
          Princely and wide;
     No pomp foregone, no pleasure lost,
          No wish denied;
     But if beneath the diamonds’ flash
          Sweet, kind eyes hide,
     A pleasant place, a happy place,
          Is our fireside.

    "It may be ’twixt four lowly walls,
          No show, no pride;
     Where sorrows oftimes enter in,
          But never abide. 
     Yet, if she sits beside the hearth,
          Help, comfort, guide,
     A blessed place, a heavenly place,
          Is our fireside."

The very instant Miss Gascoigne was gone, Christian, throwing herself on her husband’s neck, clasping him, clinging to him, ready almost to fling herself at his knees in her passion of humility and love, told him without reserve, without one pang of hesitation or shame—­perhaps, indeed, there was little or nothing to be ashamed of—­every thing concerning herself and Edwin Uniacke.

He listened, not making any answer, but only holding her fast in his arms, till at length she took courage to look up in his face.

“What! you are not angry or grieved?  Nay, I could fancy you were almost smiling.”

“Yes, my child!  Because, to tell you the plain truth, I knew all this before.”

“Knew it before!” cried Christian, in the utmost astonishment.

“I really did.  Nobody told me.  I found it out—­found it out even before I knew you.  It was the strangest thing, and yet quite natural.”

And then he explained to her that, after the disgraceful circumstance occurred which caused Mr. Uniacke’s rustication, he had fled, from justice it might be, or, in any case, from the dread of it, leaving all his papers open, and his rooms at the mercy of all comers.  But, of course, the master and dean of his college had taken immediate possession there; and Dr. Grey, being known to the young man’s widowed mother, from whom he had received much kindness in his youth, was deputed by her to overlook every thing, and investigate every thing, if by any means his relatives might arrive at the real truth of that shameful story which, now as heretofore, Dr. Grey passed over unexplained.

“It would serve no purpose to tell it,” he said, “and it is all safely ended now.”

How far his own strong, clear common sense and just judgment had succeeded in hushing it up, and saving the young man from a ruined life, and his family from intolerable disgrace, Dr. Grey was not likely to say.  But his wife guessed all, then and afterward.

He proceeded to tell her how, in searching these papers, among a heap of discreditable letters he had lighted upon two or three, pure as white lilies found lying upon a refuse heap, signed “Christian Oakley.”