Mrs. Ritson dried her eyes. A strange quiet was coming upon her now. Her voice gathered strength. She laid a hand on the head of her son, who sat before her with buried face.
"Paul," she said, "it is not until now that the day of reckoning has waited for me. When you were a babe, and knew nothing of your mother's grief, I sorrowed over the shame that might yet be yours; and when you grew to be a prattling child, I thought if God would look into your innocent eyes they would purchase grace for both of us."
Paul lifted his head. At that moment of distress God had sent him the gracious gift of tears. His eyes were wet, and looked tenderly at his mother.
"Paul," she continued, quite calmly now, "promise me one thing."
"What is it?" he asked, softly.
"That if your father should not live to make the will that must recognize you as his son, you will never reveal this secret."
Paul rose to his feet. "That is impossible. I cannot promise it," he said.
"Why?"
"Honor and justice require that my brother Hugh, and not I, should be my father's heir—he, at least, must know."
"What honor, and what justice?"