So Master Maurice, nothing loath, climbed up; and Alice, with a beating heart, saw her child in her husband’s arms for the first time. The two faces were so alike, and yet so different; she could now compare together, if she dared; but she shrank from meeting her husband’s eyes.
Maurice was completely fascinated by the strange gentleman, and regarded him with mingled curiosity and delight.
“Are you my father?” he asked incredulously.
“Yes.”
“And why did you not come to see me before?”
Here was an embarrassing question.
“Because I have been in India,” was the evasive reply.
“And are you come to stay at home now?” Momentary pause. Without waiting for a reply he pursued: “I’ve seen your picture often. Alice keeps it in a locket; that one,” pointing a firm brown finger at his unfortunate mother, and raising a scorching blush to her hitherto pale face. “She says I am to love you very much—as much as her.”
“Do you love her?” continued this pitiless innocent; “do you love Alice?”
Reginald, painfully embarrassed, cast about for a reply. In desperation he answered: