Lilia, the most innocent child in the world, and who had been listening with deepest interest, broke the silence, wide-eyed.
"You have only one name," she said. "How strange! I thought everyone had two names. I have. Mine is Lilia Stuart. Mamma's is the same. Papa's name is Clarence Stuart."
She paused, for a stifled cry broke from Irene's lips. The dainty saloon, the faces of the father and child seemed to fade before her. She was back in the parlor of Bay View, that fatal night when they had brought old Ronald Brooke home dead. Again she saw, through the blinding mist of her tears, Guy Kenmore extricating the fragment of paper from the dead hand. Again she looked over his arm and read:
"That the truth may be revealed, and my death-bed repentance accepted of Heaven, I pray humbly.
"Clarence Stuart, Senior."
"My God! what does it mean?" she asked herself; and Guy Kenmore's ambiguous answer recurred to her mind:
"A great deal—or nothing!"
"Irene, are you ill?" asked Lilia, anxiously. "You almost screamed out, and your face is as white as chalk!"
"I am very nervous. You must not let me frighten you, Lilia," the girl answered, sadly.
Lilia came coaxingly to her side.