“Hart hated Major Bertram, and would like to do him an injury.  Your mother had no love for Nina.  I nead not lengthily describe this interview.  Suffice it to say that they made a plot between them.  It was a bad plot.  I am sorry to have to use this word to a son about any act of his mother’s, but the truth must be told at all hazards.  The plot was bad, bad at the time, bad subsequently.

“Your mother arranged to give Nina to her grandfather.  She would pay him for delivering her from the child.  After receiving his bribe Hart was to leave that part of India at once, When the Major returned your mother would tell him that the child was lost.  That she feared her grandfather Hart had stolen her.  She would help Major Bertram to make inquiries.  These inquiries, she would arrange beforehand, should turn out useless, for Hart was one of those clever individuals, who, when necessary, could hide all trace of his existence.

“Your mother sold some jewellery to raise the necessary money for Hart.  He came the next day and carried off the child.  Major Bertram returned.  He believed your mother’s story, he was wild with grief at the loss of his child, and did everything in his power to recover her.  In vain.  Your mother and Hart were too clever for him.

“After a time he renewed his proposals to your mother.  She made her conditions.  You were to be acknowledged as his son.

“Soon after their marriage they returned to England, and Major Bertram retired from foreign service.  His friends received them.  The old story was never raked up.  No suspicion attached to your mother.  All the world believed you to be Major Bertram’s son.  No plot could have turned out better, and your mother rejoiced in her success.

“Her daughters were born, and she began to consider herself the happiest of living beings.  The serpent, however, which she fondly thought killed, was once more to awake and torment her.  She got a letter from Hart, who was then in Egypt.  Nina was not dead, she was alive, and strong, and handsome.  He would bring her back to her father and all the past would be known, if Mrs. Bertram did not buy his silence at a price.

“For some years after this letter she had to keep the old man quiet with money.  Then suddenly, with no apparent reason, he ceased to trouble her.  She believed that his silence was caused by Nina’s death.  She assured herself that the child must be dead, and once more her outward prosperity brought her happiness.

“Your father died, and his will was read.  There was a codicil to his will which only his wife and the solicitors knew about.  It was briefly to the effect that if by any chance the child of his first marriage was recovered, and her identity proved, she was to inherit one-half of his personal estate.  He left her this large share of his property as compensation for the unavoidable neglect he had shown her all her life, and also in sorrow for having ever confided her to the care of another.