"No, my children," Alice replied. It was two days later. They were sympathetic children; they would feel for one. "I am not afraid to tell you what troubles me day and night. I am not afraid, but I am ashamed."
"You need not be ashamed," said Molly, stoutly. "Whatever you did must have been well done."
Alice sighed. "I wish I could think so. Sit down, one on each side of me, and I will tell you. Take my hand, Molly dear."
She was lying on a couch. In these days she was troubled with her heart, and lay down a good deal. So lying, with closed eyes, she had the courage to tell her story—the whole of it—suppressing nothing: the terrible sale of her child. She told them all.
"My child was taken away," she concluded. "It was the choice of that for him, or the workhouse. My people would do nothing for me. Partly they were poor—you know them, Molly—and some of them were Methodists, and serious. So I thought of the child's welfare; and I thought I should find my husband with the money, and so—and so——"
"You let him go." Molly finished the sentence.
"I have never known a day's peace since—never a day nor a night without self-reproach. We've prospered—oh, how we've prospered! everything we touch turns to gold! And not a single day of happiness has ever dawned for me, because I meet the reproachful eyes of my boy everywhere!"
"But you gave him to a lady who would treat him well."
"The doctor promised for her. But how am I to know that she has treated him well? If I could only find out where he is! And then came that dream!"