"I washed you all clean that night. I dressed you the best I could--I didn't have much for you. But you were a sweet baby, and strong. I was kissing you and saying good-by to you then, when Miss Julia came in, right at the door."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I was kissing you and saying good-bye ... when Miss Julia came in--"]

"You were going to put me in a home--in some inst.i.tution?"

"No!" She spoke now in short, quick, sobbing breaths.... "Don, do you know the little stream that runs through the edge of the town? Do you know the deep pool beneath the bridge where the water turns around?

Well, I had washed you and dressed you.... I was going to put you _there_.... It was then that Julia came."

He turned upon her a face which it seemed to her never again could be happy and free from care.

"I didn't know all this, Mother," said he, quietly, whitely. "I ask your pardon. I ask you to forgive me."

"No, I have told you I wanted to spare you all this--I wanted that door to remain closed forever. But now it is open--you have opened it. I will have to tell you what there is behind."

It seemed many moments before she could summon self-control to go on.

"...So we two sat here in this little room, Julia and I. You were in my lap, holding up your hands and kicking up your feet, and we two wept over you--we prayed over you, too--she, that little crippled girl, hopeless, who could never have a boy of her own! I told her what I was going to do with you. She fought me and took you away from me.... And she saved you ... and she saved me.

"So now you have it." He heard her voice trailing on somewhere at a distance which seemed immeasurable. "You owe your life not to one woman, but to two, after all. Now you know why I called you Dieudonne. G.o.d sent you to me. As I have known how, I have resolved to pay my debt to G.o.d--for you. I want to pity, not hate. I want to be grateful. I want to be fair, if I can learn how."

Aurora spoke no more for some moments, nor did her son.

"We two talked it all over between us," said she after a time. "She asked me then, once, who was your father--Julia did. I said he was poor.

I told her never to ask me again. She never has. Oh, a good woman, Julia Delafield--fine, fine as the Lord ever made!

"But she knew--we both knew--that I did not have the means of bringing you up. We put our hearts together--to own you. We put our little purses together--to bring you up. She took you away from me, pretty soon. She sent you to some of her people, very distant relatives. They were poor, too, but they took you in and they never knew--they died, both of them, who took you in.

"Then for a time we sent you to an inst.i.tution for orphans. But we told everybody here that you had died. I told him so--your--your father--and I forbade him ever to speak to me again. I told you he was dead. I told him you were dead. He _is_ dead. So are _you_ dead. But all the dead have come to life. The lost is found. Oh, Don, Don, the lost is found!

I've found so much today--so much, so much. You're my boy, my own boy. A man!"

He sat mute. At length she went on.

"We schemed and saved and contrived, all the little ways that we could to save our money--we have both done that all our lives for you. We wanted to educate you, your mothers did. And oh! above all things we wanted the secret kept. I did the best I knew. They all thought you died. I didn't want you to come here--it was Miss Julia. I didn't know you were coming till you wired. I was going to tell you not to come up--even from the depot. But you got in the bus. I was delayed there in the square by those men. And then all this happened. And after twenty years!"

She sat silent, using all her splendid command of her own soul to still the stubborn fluttering in her throat.

Dieudonne Lane looked everywhere but at her.

"Mother," said he at length, "did you--did you ever--love him?"

His own face flushed at the cruelty of this question, too late, after the words were gone. He saw her wince.

"I don't know, Don," said she, simply. "It happened. It couldn't again.

You don't know about women. Seal your lips now, as mine are sealed.

Never again a question such as that to me."

The sight of her suffering at his own words stirred the elemental rage in his heart.

"Tell me," he demanded again and again. "Who was he? Is that the man? I begin to see--I'd kill him if I knew for sure."

She only shook her head.

"But you must!" said he at last. "You are cruel. You don't know."

"What is that, Don? What do you mean? Oh, I see--_it is because of her_.

It's Anne! There's someone else you love, more than you do me."

"Yes!" he confessed, "more than I do life. _That's_ the reason I must know all about myself. Can't you see I've got to play fair? There's Anne!"

"Who is she, Don--you've never told me very much yet."

"Anne Oglesby--her family lived at Columbus before she was left alone.

You know her--why, she's the ward of Judge Henderson, here in town. I believe she was left a considerable estate, and he handles it for her.

She's been here. She's told me about this place--she's seen you, maybe--before I ever did. Yes--it's Anne! I've got to think of her. I don't dare drag her into trouble--my hands are tied."

He rose now, and in his excitement walked away from his mother, so that he did not note her face at the moment.

"You see, we met from time to time back East in our college town. I never told her much about myself, because I didn't know much about myself, really, when it comes to that. I said I was an orphan, and poor. But--I'd made all the teams--and I've studied, too. I was valedictorian, in spite of all, Mother. They don't amount to much, usually--valedictorians--but I was sure I would--when I knew that Anne----

"I didn't know about our caring for one another until we found we had to part--just now, today, this morning on the train before I got off here.

Then we couldn't part, you know. So just before we pa.s.sed through this town, right on the train--today, in less than half an hour before I met you--this morning, this very day, I--we--well----"

"Yes, Don," she said, "I know!" Her eyes were very large, her face very pale.

He choked.

"But now we've got to part," said he. "If I am n.o.body, or worse, I've got to be fair with her."

A look of pride came into his mother's face at his words. "I'm glad, Don," said she. "You've got honor in you. But in no case could I see you marry that girl."

He turned upon her in sudden astonishment. "Isn't she as good as we are?

Isn't her family--don't you know the Oglesbys of Columbus--who they are and what they stand for--where they came from? Can we say as much?"

"They are better than we can claim to be, Don, yes," said she, ignoring his brutal frankness. "I know her, yes. I knew her years ago--the ward of Judge Henderson. Sometimes she has been here and kept his household for him--some day she'll live with Judge Henderson even if she marries.

He's very fond of her. But as to your marrying Anne Oglesby, you must not think of it."

"What on earth!" he began. "What have you against her?"

"It is enough that I feel as I do about any girl who has been here and who knows about--about the way--the way I've lived. Will she know who I am when she knows who _you_ are--and what you are not? Has she identified us two--have you really been fair with her?" Now the color began to rise in her paled cheeks.

"I've not had time yet! I told you it all happened just a moment ago."

Then, still brutally, he went on. "Why, what do you know of love? What do you know about the way I feel toward Anne?"

"Be as cruel as you like," said she, flushing now under such words. "I presume you feel as all men think they feel sometimes. They see that woman for that moment--they think that they believe what they say--they think they must do what they do. You are a man, yes, Don, or you could not have said to me what you have."

He flung out his arms, impatient. "I am having a fine start, am I not?

I'm a beggar, a pauper, and worse than that. I've got to pay you and Miss Julia. I've got to go on through life, with that secret on my mind.

I can't confront that man and tell him. You and I--just today meeting--why, we begin to argue. And now I've got to face Anne Oglesby with that secret. It can't be a secret from her. I'd never ask her to join her life to one like mine. And--G.o.d! a woman like her.... I can't tell you.... Death--why, I believe this is worse."