The Bridgeport evening farmer., 1909-02-13

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 sI dtd not beltere could eoer be so hagpy agda7," she naaIrmered.
 Elias didn't know 1t alL He knew half of the truth; that's all. Good Lord, l. can't read 1t, MT. Cable! You. please"
 David Cable. white faced and trem- bling, read aloud the letter from James Bansemer. It was to My beloved son." The first appealing sentences were given to explanation and apology for the determined silence he had main tained for so many months. He spoke casually of bis utter indifference to the success of certain friends who were working for his pardon. "If they se- cure my release" he wrote, 'I shall find happiness if you clasp my hand but once before l leave America for ever." Farther on he said: ''I will not accept parole. It is a poor premium on virtue, and, as you know. my stock of that commodity has been miserably low"
 ''I may be required to serve my full term" read David Cable. "In that case we should not see one another for years. my son. You have much to forgive, and l have much more to for get. We can best see our ways to the end if we seek them apart. The dark places won't seem so black. My sole purpose in writing this letter to you, my son. is to give back to you as much happiness as I can possibly extract from this pile of misery. am not pleading for anything; I am simply surrendering to the good im- pulses that are once more coming into their own after all these years of sub jection. am not apologizing to the Cables. I am doing this for your sake and for the girl who has wronged no one and to whom l have acted with a baseness which amazes me as I reflect upon it inside these narrow walls. ~-...-~---
 "You will recall that I would have permitted you to marry her-I mean. in the beginning. Perhaps it was spite which interposed later on. At least be charitable enough to call it that Clegg has been here to see me. He says you are bound to make Jane ( l. ble your wife. knew you would. For long time have held out, un' reasonably, admit, against having her as my daughter. I could not en- dure the thought of giving you up al together. Don't you comprehend my look again into her eyes after what she saw in this accursed prison. S She was born in wedlock. The story is not long one. Elias broom knows the names of her father and mother, but I am confident that he does not know all of the circum- stances. For once I was too shrewd for him. The story of my dealings in connection with Jane Cable is shame full one, and cannot hope for pardon either from you or from her.'
 Here he related as concisely as pos sible the incidents attending Mrs. Ca ble's first visit to his office and the subsequent adoption of the babe.
 "I knew that there were wealth and power behind the mystery. There was a profitable scandal in the background Unknown to Mrs. Cable, l began in vestigations of my own. She had made little or no effort to discover the parents of the child. She could have had no purpose in doing so, I'll admit ~" Here he gave in detail the prog. ress of his investigations at the Found Iings' home, at the health office, at certain unsavory hospitals and in oth- CT channels of. possibility.] *" At last I found the doctor and then the nurse. After that it was easy to un- earth the records of a child's birth and of a mothers death. all in New York city. broom can tell you the names of Jane's parents, substan- tiating the names I have just given to you. He did not know that they had been married nearly two years prior to the birth of the child. It was a clandestine marriage. . . l went straight to the father of the founding He was then but little more than twen- ty-one years of age. wild, ruthless. overbearing. heartless scoundrel, who had more money but much smaller conscience than l. Today he is a great and. l believe. respected gen. tleman, for he comes of good stock = had him trembling on his knees before me. He told me the truth Egad, my son, am rather proud of that hour with him.
 Ut seems that this young scion of a wealthy house had lost his insecure heart to the daughter of a real aristo. crat. say real because her father was pure Knickerbocker of the old school. He was naturally as poor as poverty itself. With his beautiful daughter he was living in lower New York. barely subsisting, may say, on the meager income that found its way to him through the upstairs lodgers in the old home. Here lived Jane's moth. CT, cherishing the traditions of her blood, while her father, sick and fee. ble, brooded over the days when he was king in Babylon. The hand some, wayward lover came into heI life when she was nineteen. They were married secretly in the city o1 Boston.
 ''The young husband imposed silence until after he had atttained bis ms