The decision made, and Conning for the moment relegated to second place, Lynda rose and smiled relievedly. Then her eyes fell upon her mother’s photograph which stood upon her desk.
“I’m going, dear,” she confided—they were very close, that dead mother and the live, vital daughter—“I haven’t forgotten.”
The past, like the atmosphere of the room, closed in about the girl. She was strangely cheerful and uplifted; a consciousness of approval soothed and comforted her and she recalled, as she had not for many a day, the night of her mother’s death—the night when she, a girl of seventeen, had had the burden of a mother’s confession laid upon her young heart....
“Lynda—are you there, dear?”
It had been a frequent, pathetic question during the month of illness. Lynda had been summoned from school. Brace was still at his studies.
“Yes, mother, right here!”
“You are always—right here! Lyn, once I thought I could not stand it, and I was going to run away—going in the night. As I passed your door you awoke and asked for a drink of water. I gave it, trembling lest you might notice my hat and coat; but you did not—you only said: ‘What would I do if I woke up some night and didn’t have a mother?’ Lyn, dear, I went back and—stayed!”
Lynda had thought her mother’s mind wandering so she patted the seeking hands and murmured gently to her. Then, suddenly:
“Lyn, when I married your father I thought I loved him—but I loved another! I’ve done the best I could for you all; I never let any one know; I dared not give a sign, but I want you—by and by—to go to—William Truedale! You need not explain—just go; you will be my gift to him—my last and only gift.”
Startled and horrified, Lynda had listened, understood, and grown old while her mother spoke....