kissed the little face, dried it, and kissed it with tears in her eyes.
Was it your own child?"

There was a long pause, a long silence, a terrible few minutes, and then
she answered:

"Yes, it was my child!"

Her voice was full of despair; she folded her hands and laid them on her
lap.

"I knew it must come," she said. "Now, let me try to think what I must
do. I meet now that which I have dreaded so long. Oh, Lance! my love,
Lance! my love, Lance! You will not tell him?" she cried, turning to me
with impassioned appeal. "You will not!--you could not break his heart
and mine!--you could not kill me! Oh, for Heaven's sake, say you will
not tell him?"

Then I found her on her knees at my feet, sobbing passionate cries--I
must not tell him, it would kill him, She must go away, if I said she
must; she would go from the heart and the home where she had nestled in
safety so long; she would die; she would do anything, if only I would
not tell him. He had loved and trusted her so--she loved him so dearly.
I must not tell. If I liked, she would go to the river and throw herself
in. She would give her life freely, gladly--if only I would not tell
him.

So I sat holding, as it were, the passionate, aching heart in my hand.

"You must calm yourself," I said. "Let us talk reasonably. We cannot