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Updated: June 26, 2025
"This man, this Jenkinson's claim is perfectly preposterous," he began, "but I won't go into that. The matter is before the courts. What I want to give you is a true statement of that unfortunate affair at the ranch, with which, I beg you to believe, I had nothing whatever to do." Senor Vincenza's tale might have had the merit of truth; it certainly lacked that of brevity.
The Italians had plotted to put their child in my Brian's place; they had forgotten that a mother's instinct would know her own amongst a thousand. I accused them openly of their wickedness; and, in spite of their tears and protestations, I saw from their guilty looks that it was true. My own Brian was dead, and I was left with Vincenza's child, and expected to love it as my own.
She behaved as if her coming was perfectly natural, but her face was flushed. "I didn't have a chance to bid you good-by, Smith," said she. He took her hand in his, and as Cain came forward just then, he took the boy's right hand too, and laid it beside Vincenza's. The two hands had plenty of room in one of his. The smith laughed to see them there.
"Of course, I knew Vincenza's name must be different from his half-sister's; but is that hers?" "Ugarte? Yes," said the lawyer, glancing at the parchment. "I mean the whole name," and Gerald pointed again. "Costello!" Mr. Hall gave the word its Spanish pronunciation, "Costelyo," and it sounded strange and foreign in the young man's ears.
When I grew older, the whole story of Vincenza's change of the children was told to me, and I used to think of the Italian boy who had taken my place, and wonder whether he would be sorry to exchange it for mine. I was not sorry; I loved my own life in the monastery. I wanted to be a priest.
They assured me that Brian was not dead; that it was Vincenza's child that had died; that I was incapable of distinguishing one baby from another and so on. They said that I should be separated from my own boy my Richard, whom I tenderly loved unless I put away from me this 'insane fancy, and treated that Italian baby as my son. Oh, they were cruel to me very cruel. But they got their way.
There is, I imagine, no proof possible of the truth of my suspicions. Your mother and father are, I believe, both dead. I do not remember the name of the monk who acted as my doctor. There may be relations of your parents at San Stefano, but they are not likely to know the story of Vincenza's child.
He found Mrs. Luttrell sitting with the baby on her knee, but although the poor little thing was screaming with all its might, she vouchsafed it no attention. "Tell Vincenza to take her wretched child away," she said. "I want my own. This is her child; not mine." Edward Luttrell stood aghast. "Margaret, what do you mean?" he ejaculated. "Vincenza's child is dead. This is our little Brian.
His voice was like a bell, whose tone rose from the water, and Vincenza's like a little bell, ringing on the mountain, and they found each other, and it was as if they were floating together over the silent lake, further and further, to lose themselves among the rocky mounds beyond. And so Cain and the young girl had almost reached the further bank which was wholly lost and solitary.
"If the truth could ever be ascertained, which I do not think it will be, I believe that this would turn out to be the case. The key of the whole matter lies in the fact that Vincenza had twins. One of these children was sent to the grandmother in the country; one was nursed in the village of San Stefano. A fever had broken out in the village, and Vincenza's charge the little Brian Luttrell died.
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