Jerry shivered the least little bit, perhaps from the night air, warm as it was, perhaps from the thought that she was like poor, poor Craig Winton, who did not seem at all like a real father.
In a moment her mother had wrapped her in the soft shawl she carried. Something in the loving touch of her hands broke the spell of unreality that had held Jerry.
"I don't understand, mamsey," she whispered, cuddling close, "if you felt like--_that_--and worried, why did you let me go away?"
"Because, my child," there was something triumphant in her mother's voice, "some inner sense made me believe that though you look like your father and act like him in many ways, you have a nature and a character quite of your own. I tried to put away the fears I had had which I told myself were foolish and morbid. John Westley's arguments helped me. I knew immediately that he was related to the Peter Westley who had crushed your father, but I felt certain he knew nothing of it--and I was glad; to bury the past entirely was the only way to bury forever the bitterness that had killed your father. And when John Westley made the offer to give you a year of school, I thought it was only justice! I had known school life in a big city where I had many schoolmates and I lived for several years in the shadow of a great university, though the life in it only touched me indirectly, and when the opportunity opened, I wanted you to have the same experience; I felt it might solve the problem that confronted me. And I told myself that I was _sure_ of you that you could go away to school, go anywhere, and come back again and be my same girl! Jerry, these people have been very, very good to you; out of pure generosity they have given you a great deal, do you now--now that you know the truth--feel any bitterness toward them?"
Never had Jerry associated Uncle Johnny and Mrs. Westley, nor the younger Westleys, nor the charming, hospitable home, with the Peter Westley she had pictured from Gyp's vivid descriptions. And, too, remembering the pathetic loneliness of the old man's last days, she felt nothing but pity.
"Oh, no," she answered, softly, decidedly. "Anyway, he made up for everything he'd done when he gave beautiful Highacres to Lincoln School," she added, loyally.