her in any way. A year
later Frank Davidson, the husband, was drowned at sea, and my aunt
brought a boy into the world. For five years her relatives heard
nothing. But the old grandfather had already repented of his harshness,
and enquiries were set on foot. It is an odd story, Phil, and is full
of sadness. That unhappy aunt of mine was friendless, and to obtain a
post as governess was compelled to part with her child. You can imagine
the poor thing's grief and loneliness. She placed the child with a
certain woman who kept a kind of baby-farm in the midlands. For a year
all went well, but my aunt died very suddenly of fever, and we learnt
afterwards, from people who lived near the baby-farm, that the boy we
were in search of was disposed of to a clergyman. The neighbours
remembered having seen him. I suppose one cannot blame the woman in
charge, though the thing sounds hateful and impossible in our free
England. But, finding there was no yearly instalment coming for the
child's keep, she answered an advertisement and handed him over to a
clergyman. Unfortunately she herself died a few months before we
instituted the search, and although we advertised widely we never
obtained any more information. Tell me now, Phil, what you think of
that?"

There was a long silence.

"Could it be possible that, after all, he was indeed the lost child?"
Phil asked himself. "Was it possible that the story just narrated was
his own, and referred to his father and mother. Was the vicar's test to
be a useless one, for he had trained an adopted son for one purpose
only? What joy it would be to have relations of his own?" The thoughts
crowded through his brain, and his lips trembled with hope and
eagerness.

"Douglas," he said at last, in a voice that was weak and broken with
emotion, "I believe I am your cousin I believe that that unhappy lady
you have spoken of was my dear mother, the mother I never knew. We
cannot settle the question here, but my adopted father can do so as soon
as we get back to England. Something tells me that you have helped me
to discover the secret of my birth, and if so, then all I can say is,
that I greet you as a cousin with all my heart. Providence has thrown
us together, and let us hope that the same guiding hand will keep us
good friends till the last."

The lads shook hands silently, while Tony looked on with a grin of
pleasure on his face.

"Such a one as Phil is for making pals I ne