"Yes," replied the girl, drawing nearer with wonder in her eyes, "but I know several maiden ladies who are called 'Mrs.' Mamma has a second cousin—she's dead now, I mean—but I remember her. She speculated in Wall Street and had an office, and she insisted upon being called Mrs."
"Yes, I've heard of women like her," replied Aunt Susan, "but I married a man by the same name, although no relation. Has your grandmother never spoken of him?"
"Never," replied the girl.
"Well, Alice has always hidden the family skeleton, but I will tell you all about it.
"When I was about thirty-six years of age I married Robert Carpenter. I was alone and wealthy. I loved him and tried to make his life happy, but he drank. He had inherited that habit from his father, and drinking led to gambling. He grew worse and worse. One night under the influence of drink he came home and seemed determined to pick a quarrel. Seeing that he was irresponsible I made no reply to his very insulting remarks. That angered him beyond endurance. He struck and threw me across the room. Then he left the house.
"Over on the hill by the Asylum is the grave of my little son who was born and died that night."
Ethel started.
"Yes, my dear, I have been a wife and mother. Of course, I knew nothing until the next day. I recovered consciousness but Robert had gone. He had taken all of my money that he could find in the house and he had not gone alone. His companion was a disreputable woman from the town."
Aunt Susan paused and looked over toward the little grave on the hillside.
"It seemed," she continued, "as though God, who knew my sorrow at losing my little one, sent me my two dear boys—Tom and Fred. They came into my life when I most needed them and were my greatest comfort, for I was a lonely woman, my dear. One day I received a letter written in a strange hand saying that my husband was ill and not likely to live—that he wished for me, to ask my forgiveness, and he begged me for God's sake to go to him. I went. He was in Detroit in a squalid boarding house. I was shocked at the change. I had not realized that a man could so lose his good looks as he had done. I took him to a clean place kept by a woman who had been highly recommended. Upon my arrival he wept bitterly and begged my pardon. Then I was glad that I had never divorced him as my friends had advised, for the poor man had been deserted by his companion when the money had gone. He had kept on sinking lower and lower, ashamed to appeal to me until when what he thought to be his last illness came upon him he sent for me to ask my forgiveness."