Patience winced and shrank away from his caress while he walked up and down the room, talking cheerfully.

"Now my mind is at rest," he said, with a sigh of relief. "I thought the mystery of my birth involved some stain, but since I have the right to bear my father's name, why! I feel quite happy. I can make my way in the world by myself, can ask the girl I love to be my wife."

"The girl you love," she repeated jealously.

"Yes, I will tell you her name, though no one else knows it--Una."

"Miss Challoner," said the woman, starting up; "impossible!"

"Why impossible?" he retorted gaily. "You think I am not rich enough. Never mind; I carry a fortune in my throat, and will soon be able to keep her in comfort. She loves me and I love her, so we shall be quite happy."

"I hope so," she said fervently. "May God's blessing rest on your efforts. Yes, marry Una Challoner if she loves you, and make your own way without troubling about the dead."

"I never knew my parents," said Reginald, sighing, "so I can hardly regret them, but with Una to work for I will forget the past and look forward to the future. I have nothing to offer her now but a stainless name. Never mind; ambition can perform miracles. Now, good-bye, nurse; I must get back to Garsworth."

"Good-bye," she said, kissing him eagerly. "Come again soon, my dear boy; and although Una Challoner loves you, do not forget your old nurse."

"Of course not," he replied gaily, and walked away humming an air. Patience Allerby waited till the door was closed and the sound of his voice had died away, then fell on her knees, beating her breast with her hands and weeping bitterly.

"God! God!" she cried, amid convulsive sobs, "pardon my sin. It was for his sake, for his dear sake, not for my own. Let the dead past be forgotten. Let him never know anything but what I have told him, and bless him, oh God, in his future life."

There was a crucifix of black ebony against the wall, and from it, with pitying eyes, looked down the face of the Lord at the stricken woman kneeling before him. The ineffable sorrow of the sacred face seemed to calm her spirit, for she ceased to weep and her lips moved in a prayer which seemed to come from her heart. "Forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass against us."

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