You are patience and kindness itself," he said, going back to his former place and resuming his former gentleness of manner.

"Now that I have got over my first confession of the misery that follows me in secret wherever I go, I think I can tell you calmly all that remains to be told.

You see, as I said, my Uncle Stephen" he turned away his head quickly, and looked down at the table as the name passed his lips--"my Uncle Stephen came twice to Wincot while I was a child, and on both occasions frightened me dreadfully.

He only took me up in his arms and spoke to me--very kindly, as I afterward heard, for _him_--but he terrified me, nevertheless.

Perhaps I was frightened at his great stature, his swarthy complexion, and his thick black hair and mustache, as other children might have been; perhaps the mere sight of him had some strange influence on me which I could not then understand and cannot now explain.