Antrobus disguised what was already
obscure, and that "Mr. George" of the "troublesome Talk of the
Inn-people" is an abbreviated pseudonyme.
Mr. Antrobus was a humane and benevolent man, as well as an
inquisitive one. He delicately assisted to make the sick guest
more comfortable in his wasting body. He won his confidence,
genuinely compassionated his anxieties, and presently pledged
himself to a most kindly office--the care and provision in future
for the child soon to be fatherless; long before this time
motherless. Whether she was motherless by the actual death of the
parent, or not, Mr. Antrobus did not learn, or does not tell. But he
did learn, by a confession, that "Mr. George" was really George
X--, a gypsy, and one withal of unusual education and breeding.
More remarkable still, he was a gypsy intensely embittered
against' a race from which he had lived for many years wholly
withdrawn. The cause of such sentiments and renegade existence
good Mr. Antrobus "tryed in vain, with much Delicacy" to
discover. At the clearest, it appeared to him to date from the dying
man's marriage and from some stormy period of his career. In any
case, the renunciation of "Mr. George" in lot and part in gypsydom
was of savage sincerity. He would not tolerate the idea of his child
being left open to such influences; and, as a matter of her happy
fortune in meeting with our kind Bath antiquarian, she never
encountered them.
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