'Well, hear it, then, once for all, and then, if you
will, give me up to the officers. Some years ago,' he continued,
coldly and steadily--'some years ago, a woman, a nurse, was placed in
charge of two infant children, both boys: one of these was her own;
the other was the son of rich, proud parents. The woman's husband was
a gay, jolly fellow, who much preferred spending money to earning it,
and just then it happened that he was more than usually hard up. One
afternoon, on visiting his wife, who had removed to a distance, he
found that the rich man's child had sickened of the small-pox, and
that there was no chance of its recovery. A letter containing the sad
news was on a table, which he, the husband, took the liberty to open
and read. After some reflection, suggested by what he had heard of the
lady-mother's state of mind, he recopied the letter, for the sake of
embodying in it a certain suggestion. That letter was duly posted, and
the next day brought the rich man almost in a state of distraction;
but his chief and mastering terror was lest the mother of the already
dead infant should hear, in her then precarious state, of what had
happened. The tidings, he was sure, would kill her. Seeing this, the
cunning husband of the nurse suggested that, for the present, his--the
cunning one's--child might be taken to the lady as her own, and that
the truth could be revealed when she was strong enough to bear it.
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