Clara now began to find that she must in justice to her aunt’s memory tell her father something more.  And yet it would be very difficult to tell him anything that would not bring greater affliction upon him, and would not also lead her into deeper trouble.  Should it come to pass that her aunt’s intention with reference to the fifteen hundred pounds was mentioned, she would be subjected to an endless persecution as to the duty of accepting that money from Captain Aylmer.  But her present feelings would have made her much prefer to beg her bread upon the roads than accept her late lover’s generosity.  And then again, how could she explain to her father Mrs Winterfield’s mistake about her own position without seeming to accuse her father of having robbed her?  But nevertheless she must say something, as Mr Amedroz continued to apply that epithet of heartless to Mrs Winterfield, going on with it in a low droning tone, that was more injurious to Clara’s ears than the first full energy of his anger.

‘Heartless quite heartless shockingly heartless shockingly heartless!’

‘The truth is, papa,’ Clara said at last, ’that when my aunt told me about her will, she did not know but what I had some adequate provision from my own family.’

‘Oh, Clara!’

’That is the truth, papa for she explained the whole thing to me.  I could not tell her that she was mistaken, and thus ask for her money.’

‘But she knew everything about that poor wretched boy.’  And now the father dropped back into his chair, and buried his face in his hands.

When he did this Clara again knelt at his feet.  She felt that she had been cruel, and that she had defended her aunt at the cost of her own father.  She had, as it were, thrown in his teeth his own imprudence, and twitted him with the injuries which he had done to her.  ‘Papa,’ she said, ’dear papa, do not think about it at all.  What is the use?  After all, money is not everything.  I care nothing for money.  If you will only agree to banish the subject altogether, we shall be so comfortable.’

‘How is it to be banished?’

’At any rate we need not speak of it.  Why should we talk on a subject which is simply uncomfortable, and which we cannot mend?’

‘Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear!’ And now he swayed himself backwards and forwards in his chair, bewailing his own condition and hers, and his past imprudence, while the tears ran down his checks.  She still knelt there at his feet, looking up into his face with loving, beseeching eyes, praying him to be comforted, and declaring that all would still be well if he would only forget the subject, or, at any rate, cease to speak of it.  But still he went on wailing, complaining of his lot as a child complains, and refusing all consolation.  ‘Yes; I know,’ said he, ‘it has all been my fault.  But how could I help it?  What was I to do?’

’Papa, nobody has said that anything was your fault; nobody has thought so.’