I wish we had; all this might have been avoided.

But the poor soul always desired that the secret of his birth might be kept from Charles, and you see the consequences.

I'll never keep a secret again.

Come here with me; let us see both of them." They followed him, and he turned into a little side room at the back of the house.

It was a room used for chance visitors or strangers, containing two small beds, which now bore an unaccustomed burden, for beneath the snow-white coverlids, lay two figures, indistinct indeed, but unmistakeable.
"Which is he ?" whispered the Doctor.
Sam raised the counterpane from the nearest one, but it was not Charles.