The lad had no choice but to obey; indeed, I forced him to it by attacking him and compelling him to draw, which is how I came by this wound.
"Crispin had of a certainty killed Joseph but that your uncle bethought him of telling him that his son lived." "He saved his life by a lie! That was worthy of him," said Cynthia scornfully.
"Nay, child, he spoke the truth, and when Joseph offered to restore the boy to him, he had every intention of so doing.

But in the moment of writing the superscription to the letter Crispin was to bear to those that had reared the child, Joseph bethought him of a foul scheme for Galliard's final destruction.

And so he has sent him to London instead, to a house in Thames Street, where dwells one Colonel Pride, who bears Sir Crispin a heavy grudge, and into whose hands he will be thus delivered.

Can aught be done, Cynthia, to arrest this--to save Sir Crispin from Joseph's snare ?" "As well might you seek to restore the breath to a dead man," she answered, and her voice was so oddly calm, so cold and bare of expression, that Gregory shuddered to hear it.
"Do not delude yourself," she added.

"Sir Crispin will have reached London long ere this, and by now Joseph will be well on his way to see that there is no mistake made, and that the life you ruined hopelessly years ago is plucked at last from this unfortunate man.