“You needn’t,” returned Nelly; “I knew it since yestherday mornin’.”

“So you think,” he replied, “an’ it’s but nathural you should, I was at the place this day, and seen where you dug the Casharrawan.  I have been strugglin’ for years to keep this saicret, an’ now it must come out; but I’m not a murdherer.”

“What saicret, father, if you’re not a murdherer?” asked Sarah; “what saicret; but there is not murder on you; do you say that?”

“I do say it; there’s neither blood nor murdher on my head! but I know who the murdherer is, an’ I can keep the saicret no longer!”

Sarah laughed, and her eyes sparkled up with singular vividness.  “That’ll do,” she exclaimed; “that’ll do; all’s right now; you’re not a murdherer, you killed no man, aither in cowld blood or otherwise; ha! ha! you’re a good father; you’re a good father; I forgive you all now, all you ever did.”

Nelly stood contemplating her husband with a serious, firm, but dissatisfied look; her chin was supported upon her forefinger and thumb; and instead of seeming relieved by the disclosure she had just heard, which exonerated him from the charge of blood, she still kept her eyes riveted upon him with a stern and incredulous aspect.

“Spake out, then,” she observed coolly, “an’ tell us all, for I am not convinced.”

Sarah looked as if she would have sprang at her.

“You are not convinced,” she exclaimed; “you are not convinced!  Do you think he’d tell a lie on such a subject as this?” But no sooner had she uttered the words than she started as if seized by a spasm.  “Ah, father,” she exclaimed, “it’s now your want of truth comes against you; but still, still I believe you.”

“Tell us all about it,” said Nelly, coldly; “let us hear all.”

“But you both promise solemnly, in the sight of God, never to breathe this to a human being till I give yez lave.”

“We do; we do,” replied Sarah; “in the sight of God, we do.”

“You don’t spake,” said he, addressing Nelly.

“I promise it.”

“In the sight of God?” he added, “for I know you.”

“Ay.” said she, “in the sight of God, since you must have it so.”

“Well, then,” said he, “the common report is right; the man that murdhered him is Condy Dalton.  I have kept it in till I can bear it no longer.  It’s my intention to go to a magistrate’s as soon as my face gets well.  For near two-and-twenty years, now, this saicret is lyin’ hard upon me; but I’ll aise my mind, and let justice take it’s coorse.  Bad I have been, but never so bad as to take my fellow-crature’s life.”

“Well, I’m glad to hear it,” said his wife; “an’ now I can undherstand you.”

“And I’m both glad and sorry,” exclaimed Sarah; “sorry for the sake of the Daltons.  Oh! who would suppose it! and what will become of them?”

“I have no peace,” her father added; “I have not had a minute’s peace ever since it happened; for sure, they say, any one that keeps their knowledge of murdher saicret and won’t tell it, is as bad as the murdherer himself.  There’s another thing I have to mention,” he added, after a pause; “but I’ll wait for a day or two; it’s a thing I lost, an’, as the case stands now, I can do nothing widout it.”