loves you so much; and if you could hear him talk about you in his
pretty way, and if he could ask you what I ask you now, you couldn't
refuse him.

"It is natural," she went on rapidly, in a voice that trembled
strangely between pride and humility,--"it's natural that he should
take to you, miss, for his father, when I first knew him, was a
gentleman,--and the boy must forget me, sooner or later,--and so I
ain't a-goin' to cry about that. For I come to ask you to take my
Tommy,--God bless him for the bestest, sweetest boy that lives,--to--
to--take him with you."

She had risen and caught the young girl's hand in her own, and had
fallen on her knees beside her.

"I've money plenty, and it's all yours and his. Put him in some good
school, where you can go and see him, and help him to--to--to forget
his mother. Do with him what you like. The worst you can do will be
kindness to what he will learn with me. Only take him out of this
wicked life, this cruel place, this home of shame and sorrow. You
will! I know you will,--won't you? You will,--you must not, you cannot
say no! You will make him as pure, as gentle as yourself; and when he
has grown-up, you will tell him his father's name,--the name that
hasn't passed my lips for years,--the name of Alexander Morton, whom
they call here Sandy! Miss Mary!--do not take your hand away! Miss
Mary, speak to me! You will take my boy? Do not put your face from me.
I know it ought not to look on such as me. Miss Mary!--my God, be
merciful!--she is leaving me!" Miss Mary had risen, and, in the
gathering twilight, had felt her way to the open window. She stood
there, leaning against the casement, her eyes fixed on the last rosy