Will N. Harben

“ I saw the shadow of spiritual death in your countenance the day I met you at Dearing's. Yes, the child is yours, as well as he is mine. God has made him a part of you, as he is a part of me. And he loves you, Kenneth, he loves you—and admires you above all men. Young as he is, it would actually pain him to be separated from you. And you are asking me to be your wife!” She shrugged her shoulders, her proud lip quivered, and she looked away. “You are asking me, and now!”
“Yes, Dora, to be my wife before the world, as you have been in God's sight all these years. ”

“ Lionel cried, disappointedly, as he stood panting, his silken tresses tossed about his face. “You let him get away. I'd have had him if you hadn't spoken. But I don't care, I can get him!” And he was off like the wind toward the tree, on a lower bough of which the kitten was perched, blandly eying his pursuer.
“You are as fond of children as ever,” the General remarked, “and it proves that your heart is in the right spot. Show me a man who has no use for little tots, and I'll show you a man who will cheat you in a transaction.” ”

“ I am expected to salve the wounds of a torn and mangled womanhood with the realization that I am providing for my boy. There is no pain keener than the fear that one's offspring may suffer what we ourselves have been through, and I'd give my soul to see Lionel happy in the time to come, but I can't bring it about in the way you ask. I simply can't! I loved you, Kenneth, before that unspeakable cloud fell between us, but I was only a girl then, and during all the years that have passed since I have given you no place at all in my heart. We are, in fact, meeting to-day as strangers. ”

“ Far-off Paris beckons me, Margaret, even in my sleep. Mother and I read of nothing else now, and think of nothing else. We study French in our poor way, and speak it together. Even Lionel lisps a word of it now and then. Yes, Paris and my boy mean all to me now. This has been a prison for our little family, but there the breath of art animates all life. The people are not narrow; they rank essential purity above the sordid hypocrisy of mere convention. ”

“ Mrs. Barry faltered, with a suppressed sob in her pillow. “All these years I have wondered over your great trouble, and why you were not more open with me about it, but Lionel has made it clear. I understand now.”
“Did Kenneth Galt tell my child that—” Dora cried out, in a rasping undertone. “Did he dare to—”
“No, no, not that!” the old woman corrected. “He simply betrayed himself in his conduct toward the boy. Listen! Lionel need never suspect that you know what he did, but you must be told the truth. It is too beautiful for you to miss.” ”

“ Barry's. Lionel was playing with some colored building-blocks on the porch, and looked up in vast surprise.
“Where is your mother?” Margaret asked, timidly. “May I see her?”
“She is in the studio,” the child said. “She is making a picture.”
At this moment Dora stepped out into the hall from a room on the right, and with a look of undisguised and almost perturbed surprise she came forward.
“Oh, she is beautiful—beautiful!” ran like a dart through the visitor's brain. “She is a thousand times more now than she used to be; she has grown, developed. ”

“ Of course, Miss Margaret, I hadn't the least idea but—”
“Well, don't let it get out, for all you do, Toby,” Margaret laughed, merrily. “Don't forget, Mr. Walton; by to-night's mail, sure!”
And the next instant she had floated out of the room, leaving the red-face banker under the perplexed stare of his apologetic clerk.
“She oughtn't to have done that!” Walton growled, as he brushed the shoulders of his coat where her gloved hands had rested and stroked his tingling cheek. “She had no business going as far as that. Women are such dad-dratted galoots when they get wound up in any matter. ”

“ Galt replied. Deep down within him something seemed to clutch his vitals. In the ear of his naked soul an accusing voice was sounding: “Inherited! Inherited!” The word rang out like a threat from the Infinite—from the vast mystery of life which had of late been so tenaciously closing around him. Even the pain Lionel was to undergo was the outcome of another's sin.
“Oh, it is a very simple operation,” Dearing went on, “and in any ordinary case I shouldn't give it a second thought; but, by George, I have become attached to that little chap. He is the pluckiest little man I ever knew. ”

“ A city so well policed as Atlanta would prove a poor hiding-place for a penniless fugitive. A telegram from Stafford would put the authorities on the alert, and escape would be impossible. And no sentimental reasons would check prompt action on the part of old Simon Walton. In his rage over the discovery of the unexpected loss of such a large amount of ever-needed cash, he would balk at nothing. Of family pride he had little—certainly not pride strong enough to make him a party to the concealment of crime, even in his own blood. ”

“ There was a catch in the young mother's voice; a tinge of anxious pallor crept into her appealing face. “Oh, Wynn, you are too kind! You are thinking only of helping me. There is your uncle and your sister—I could not bear to trust my darling where he might not be—wanted.”
“I know my uncle and sister better than you do,” Dearing said. “Margaret has never seen Lionel that I know of, but she would love to make him happy. As for my uncle, he greatly admires the little fellow, and would be delighted to have him come and romp over the place to his heart's content.” ”

“ Galt cried out. “Ah, that's a beauty! Now, beat him till he takes it back!” Lionel needed no such advice. His little fists moved like the spokes of a turning wheel. A shrill howl of defeat rose from the conquered bully, and he uttered a prolonged scream of genuine alarm. Then emerged from a side door of the Weston house no less a personage than the Congressman himself, and he ran across the grass, taking flower-pots and beds of roses at long leaps.
Reaching the fighters, he grasped Lionel by the collar of his blouse and drew him off of his cowering son. ”

“ After all, it would be nice, Galt reflected to-day, and a step of that sort might ultimately quiet the dull aching of heart which had been his for so many years. Few men had ever had to such a marked degree the pronounced yearning toward paternity as had come to the lonely bachelor since the chief mistake of his life. His love for children was more like that of a woman who has tasted and lost the joys of motherhood than that of a man of the world. ”

“ Galt answered, with a faint, forced smile. “I can't say that I am worrying over that.”
“Well, the condition of the minds of patients,” said Dearing, “is the biggest thing doctors have to tackle. We can hold our own with a disease of the body, because we can see it and, at least, experiment with it for good or bad; but when the seat of the thing is in a man's soul, and he won't uncover it, but keeps fooling himself and his doctor by looking for it under his hide or in his blood or bones, why, we are at a standstill. ”

“ On the deck, near the stern, somewhat removed from the others and leaning against the railing, stood a man and a child and a young woman so beautiful and so richly clad that the eyes of many of the passengers and their friends, who had massed themselves on the pier below, were fixed upon her admiringly.
“It is going to be a glorious voyage, darling,” Kenneth Galt said, as he stroked the golden hair of the child. “The bay is as smooth as glass. Look how the people are staring at you! You cannot dream how beautiful you are. Are you happy, Dora?” ”

“ I'll tell you one thing, though, Madge, little girl: the matter looks black enough as it stands; but, really, if I felt that you were going absolutely penniless to a man who has shown himself as reckless of his own interests as Fred Walton has, I'd be blue in earnest, and—and I don't know that I'd be quite able to restrain my temper if such a reckless spendthrift were to thrust himself between you and your natural rights, boldly robbing you, blind as you now are, of what you ought to have, and which later in life you will sadly need. ”

“ He sank into a chair in front of her, and, pale and quivering in every limb, swung his hat between his knees.
“Yes; she is my daughter, but she is above me in a thousand ways. She suffered untold agonies after you desert—after you left Stafford, and all through her trouble; but when the baby came, and we were all shut up here away from human sight, the choicest blessings from on high seemed to fall on her. With her close work in her studio, and her devotion to the child, she grew into something more of heaven than of earth. ”

“ Lionel asked, anxiously. “Mamma, he can't talk. He tries, but he can't; he is trembling all over; he is about to cry. What is the matter with him?”
Reaching up, and without a word, Dora took the child into her arms, and, holding him across her lap as if he had been an infant, she bent over his face to kiss him. Presently she looked up at Galt, and her proud lip trembled as she said:
“Oh, Kenneth, fate is handling us strangely. I spoke harshly just now, for I can see that you are suffering. I wish I could be less human. After all my dreams, I am of the earth, earthy. ”

“ Dora had accepted the inevitable, as any sensible woman would have done, and it was left for him to go on his way unmolested—free! General Sylvester wanted him to marry his niece; she was his social equal, and in time would be as well off in point of fortune. She was a beautiful, imposing, gracious woman, and would make a wife any man would be proud of. Yes, his duty to himself was clear, and dreams like young Dearing indulged in would have to be banished for ever and ever. Yes, he would marry Margaret Dearing, and he and she would travel the world over. ”

“ Yes, something had to be done, Kenneth Galt told his tortured inner self, as he stood and watched the boy trip lightly homeward—some one had to fight and struggle and smart as a consequence of the wrong that had been done, and the duty had fallen on a little child. Through the slow, weary years of perhaps a long life the fight just beginning would go on, and the chief cause of it must shirk it all. ”

“ Margaret laughed, teasingly. “Perhaps he'll unbend and sit on the grass like a school-boy. He is, after all, only flesh and blood, dear uncle, odd as the fact may seem to you.”
“Well, don't hurl that sort of thing at him,” Sylvester retorted, rather testily. “After all, a man not much over forty, who succeeds in an enterprise which belongs to the history of the land, and at the same time puts money into your pocket and mine in big lumps and rolls, does deserve consideration. Why, he has made you rich, Madge! ”

“ He's nothing but a mean, horrid boy, while you are—”
“I am what, Lionel?” Galt's voice was stayed by huskiness in his throat, and he put an unsteady arm round the little form, resisting the yearning to clasp him tightly.
“Oh, you are everything—everything in the world. Doctor Wynn says you are very, very rich, and that you love all little boys—that's why I jumped that day. I wouldn't be afraid to jump from a higher tree than that if you were there to catch me. Oh, I like to have people love me! I like it better than anything.” ”

“ Dora cried, covering her face with her shapely hands. “Of all things, I can think of nothing right now that I'd like better than that. I have been trying to forget Lionel's confinement in this little yard and house—trying to convince myself that he is wholly happy only with mother and me, but it is no use. It is really pitiful to think of. He has a wonderful imagination, and he sometimes sits here on the porch and tries to picture to himself what the inside of a big house like yours is. He thinks you all must be kings and princes like those in the fairy-tales we read to him. ”

“ Some men are coarse enough to have a contempt for the rights, social and otherwise, of their own children of illegitimate birth; but Kenneth Galt, in despising many of the laws of man, gave little Lionel the credit of being the product of a law he himself had made, and which, therefore, was worthy of consideration. In some States the declaration by a pair that they intend to live together constitutes a legal marriage, and it was with that broad view that Dora, blinded by faith in the superior knowledge of her lover, had unquestioningly delivered herself. ”

“ Miss Margaret, you could do me a big, lasting favor if you'd let this thing go through. I'm a plain man. Folks hain't never said I was much of a hand to show affection, and they are right, I reckon; but the way matters stand now is getting me down, and if you don't extend a helping hand I'm afraid I'll feel bad the rest of my life. It ain't just Fred that's concerned—it's me—me! As long as a father can make himself believe he is treating his son justly, he can hold his head up and meet the eye of the world; but, if the truth must be told, I reckon I didn't give Fred a good enough show. ”

“ Dearing, without looking directly at the speaker, shook his head. “It is only fair to her to say that she is not made that way, Fred. She believes in you; nothing on earth will change her; she believes you are the soul of honor, and is ready to throw my uncle's money into his face. That's why I came to you—to you. I thought, and Uncle Tom did, too, that under the circumstances you might, you see, rather than stand between her and—”
Dearing went no further. He was interrupted by the look of agony which had clutched the lineaments of the listener like the throes of death. ”