Judge Henderson sat astounded, looking at her steadily, unable to grasp all the emotion which evidently she felt, unable wholly to understand an act of clean unselfishness on the part of any human being.
"You see," said Miss Julia tremblingly, after a time—"his father—I never knew his father. She'd never tell me—I never asked but once. But you see, I only fancied that he had a father. I fancied I was his mother. I fancied——" But now Miss Julia's voice failed her, and her blushes alone spoke.
"I see," said Judge Henderson, not unkindly, and breathing more freely, "you fancied that you held an undivided interest in this child, this young man." She did not see his face very plainly, did not catch his hesitation as he engaged on this touchy theme.
Miss Julia nodded rapidly, swallowing hard. Her face was very beautiful indeed now. (The angels must have smiled with tears in their eyes as they looked down upon her now and saw how pathetically beautiful she was!)
"And that interest is still undivided?"
"Yes, we've not seen each other very much, Aurora and I, today, because things have been traveling so fast, but we are—we are partners in this trouble, as in everything else. We've got to have a lawyer, of course. There's not much money left between us—even my next month's salary is pledged. It cost more than we thought to get him through the graduation. There were clothes, you know—many things." And now she flushed again vividly. She was thinking of Don's little clothes, which once long ago she had helped to sew; and the angels knew this, gravely.
"He's a splendid young man, our boy!" she broke out again at length. "Can't you see that? Good in his classes—and an athlete—a splendid one. He's such a gentleman in all his ways, Judge Henderson, a son worthy of a father, of some good father, if only he had one! His father died, you know, when Don was just a baby." She was not looking at him now, not daring, as she went on.
"But you see, we are in trouble about him. That may come to anyone. Why, even you yourself, Judge Henderson, successful as you are—some time even you may know such a thing as trouble. It is the common human lot. And I have been told enough——"
"If I were in trouble," said Judge Henderson gallantly, and with a push of a full ounce of Monongahela back of his words, "I would go to just some such woman as you for help. But women don't seem to see any of the intervening obstacles that exist, do they, Miss Julia?"
"If we did, the world would stop," said Miss Julia, simply. And spoke a great truth.