Page 488 - for-the-term-of-his-natural-life

object of her life to set him free, he had cherished for her no
affection. It was her beauty that had attracted him, when,
as Mr. Lionel Crofton, he swaggered in the night-society of
London. Her talents and her devotion were secondary con-
siderations—useful to him as attributes of a creature he
owned, but not to be thought of when his fancy wearied of
its choice. During the twelve years which had passed since
his rashness had delivered him into the hands of the law
at the house of Green, the coiner, he had been oppressed
with no regrets for her fate. He had, indeed, seen and suf-
fered so much that the old life had been put away from him.
When, on his return, he heard that Sarah Purfoy was still
in Hobart Town, he was glad, for he knew that he had an
ally who would do her utmost to help him—she had shown
that on board the Malabar. But he was also sorry, for he re-
membered that the price she would demand for her services
was his affection, and that had cooled long ago. However, he
would make use of her. There might be a way to discard her
if she proved troublesome.
His pretended piety had accomplished the end he had
assumed it for. Despite Frere’s exposure of his cryptograph,
he had won the confidence of Meekin; and into that wor-
thy creature’s ear he poured a strange and sad story. He
was the son, he said, of a clergyman of the Church of Eng-
land, whose real name, such was his reverence for the cloth,
should never pass his lips. He was transported for a forgery
which he did not commit. Sarah Purfoy was his wife—his
erring, lost and yet loved wife. She, an innocent and trusting
girl, had determined— strong in the remembrance of that