the years gone by--of the gentle girl, the companion of her
childhood, who had never given her an unkind word--of _him_--
the only man she had ever loved--and Dora was their child--Fanny's
child and John's.

"Yes," she said, half aloud, "I will give her a home," but anon
there came stealing over her the old bitterness of feeling, which
she had cherished since she knew that Fanny was preferred to
herself, and then the evil of her nature whispered, "No, I will
not receive their child. We can hardly manage to live now, and it
is not my duty to incur an additional expense. Dora must stay
where she is, and if I do not answer the letter, she will
naturally suppose I never received it."

Thus deciding the matter, she crushed the letter into her pocket
and went back to her work; but there was an added weight upon her
spirits, while continually ringing in her ears were the words,
"Care for John's child and mine." "If I could only make her of any
use to me," she said at last, and then as her eye fell upon
_Bridget_, whose stay with her was so uncertain, the dark
thought entered her mind, "Why could not Dora fill her place? It
would be a great saving, and of course the child must expect to
work."

Still, reason as she would, Mrs. Deane could not at once bring
herself to the point of making a menial of one who was every way
her equal; neither could she decide to pass the letter by
unnoticed; so for the present she strove to dismiss the subject,
which was not broached to her daughters until the evening on which
we first introduced them to our readers. Then taking her seat by