“Mother, Helen is right; we should speak out, and not hide this bitter fact any longer. The world will pity us, and we must bear the pity, but it would condemn us for deceit, and we should deserve the condemnation if we let this misery go on. Living a lie will ruin us all. Bella will be destroyed as Helen was; I am only the shadow of a man now, and Hal is killing himself as fast as he can, to avoid the fate we all dread.”
Augustine spoke first, for Mrs. Carrol sat speechless with her trouble as Christie paused.
“Keep to your prayers, and let me go my own way, it’s the shortest,” muttered Harry, with his face hidden, and his head down on his folded arms.
“Boys, boys, you’ll kill me if you say such things! I have more now than I can bear. Don’t drive me wild with your reproaches to each other!” cried their mother, her heart rent with the remorse that came too late.
“No fear of that; you are not a Carrol,” answered Harry, with the pitiless bluntness of a resentful and rebellious boy.
Augustine turned on him with a wrathful flash of the eye, and a warning ring in his stern voice, as he pointed to the door.
“You shall not insult your mother! Ask her pardon, or go!”
“She should ask mine! I’ll go. When you want me, you’ll know where to find me.” And, with a reckless laugh, Harry stormed out of the room.
Augustine’s indignant face grew full of a new trouble as the door banged below, and he pressed his thin hands tightly together, saying, as if to himself:
“Heaven help me! Yes, I do know; for, night after night, I find and bring the poor lad home from gambling-tables and the hells where souls like his are lost.”