And the two, father and daughter, moved on, slowly and laboriously, as they had come. Thomas stood following them with his eyes, until a low, half-stifled moan suddenly called him to his mother’s side. Her frame trembled violently.
“Mother, mother,” implored he, stooping over her, “what has happened? Why are you no more yourself?”
“Ah, my son, I can bear it no longer,” sobbed she. “God forgive me—thou must know it all.”
He sat down at her side and drew her closely up to him and she hid her face on his bosom. There was a long silence, only broken by the loud chirruping of the crickets.
“My son,” she began at last, still hiding her face, “thou art a child of guilt.”
“That has been no secret to me, mother,” answered he, gravely and tenderly, “since I was old enough to know what guilt was.”
She quickly raised her head, and a look of amazement, of joyous surprise, shone through the tears that veiled her eyes. She could read nothing but filial love and confidence in those grave, manly features, and she saw in that moment that all her doubts had been groundless, that her long prayerful struggle had been for naught.
“I brought thee into the world nameless,” she whispered, “and thou hast no word of reproach for me?”
“With God’s help, I am strong enough to conquer a name for myself, mother,” was his answer.
It was the very words of her own secret wish, and upon his lips they sounded like a blessed assurance, like a miraculous fulfillment of her motherly prayer.