"Is it--is it true?" he whispered.

"True as there is a God in Heaven."

"Then, mother, give me my name! Now I ask you, for the first time, who
was my father?"

She wrung her hands and moaned. The sight of her son's eager, expectant
face, touched with a light which she had never before seen upon it,
seemed to give her another and a different pang.

"That, too!" She murmured to herself.

"Gilbert," she then said, "have I always been a faithful mother to you?
Have I been true and honest in word and deed? Have I done my best to
help you in all right ways,--to make you comfortable, to spare you
trouble? Have I ever,--I'll not say acted, for nobody's judgment is
perfect,--but tried to act otherwise than as I thought it might be for
your good?"

"You have done all that you could say, and more, mother."

"Then, my boy, is it too much for me to ask that you should believe my
word,--that you should let it stand for the truth, without my giving
proofs and testimonies? For, Gilbert, that I _must_ ask of you, hard as
it may seem. If you will only be content with the knowledge--: but then,
you have felt the shame all this while; it was my fault, mine, and I
ought to ask your forgiveness"--

"Mother--mother!" he interrupted, "don't talk that way! Yes--I believe