“Why isn’t he here taking care of you now? Where is your child’s father?”
A swift surprise passed through Lorraine’s eyes, as if it had not occured to her Hal would not know the truth. Then she said, very softly, “Alymer.”
“Ah!”
The exclamation seemed wrung from Hal unconsciously, and after it her lips grew strangely rigid.
“Hal,” Lorraine said weakly, “I’ve loved Alymer almost ever since I first saw him. I swore I would not harm his career, and I have not. I will not in future. But the child is his, and I thank God for it. I do not believe an illegitimate child with a devoted mother is any worse off than the legitimate child with a selfish, unloving one. That there is love enough matters the most. What can any child have better than a life’s devotion?”
Later on she said:
“This is his great week, Hal. In his last letter he tells me his big chance has come at last through Sir Philip Hall. We always hoped it would. It is the big libel case, and if Sir Philip chooses he can let him take a very prominent part. He will, I am sure of it. He is very interested in him, and he has given him this chance on purpose. Flip thinks it will lead to a great deal; and of course if so it is splendid for him.”
Hal said very little. She was overcome at the revelation Lorraine had made, and seemed quite unable to grasp it.
Meanwhile she waited fearfully for the crisis the doctor had told her was impending. She was expecting him to call again, and was relieved when at last he arrived bringing a pleasant-faced French nurse with him.
She relinquished her post then, and waited for him anxiously downstairs. When he came he told her he must have another opinion at once, and Hal knew that something serious was wrong, and that he feared the worst.