"They ran away," he repeated, as Brandon walked beside him making no answer, "a very long time before my mamma was born, and they never came back any more till I was nearly six years old." "So that's your tutor's house, is it ?" said Brandon, and thereupon he took leave of him.
"Amazing!" he said to himself as he walked away.

"What next, I wonder ?" As he returned he revolved this information in his mind with increasing surprise.

John Mortimer had a proud and confident way of talking about his father that did not sound as if he knew that he had begun life by running away from home.

Valentine, he was well aware, knew nothing about it.
Coming on, he turned aside to talk to some men who were digging a well.
He knew how to talk to working people, and, what is more to the purpose, he knew how to make them talk; but though they proffered a good deal of information about the neighbourhood, nothing was said that gave him any of the knowledge he wanted.

And shortly he went on, and let himself in at the little gate with his key.