"Kill me, Charles," cried she, passionately; "but don't look at me so
and speak to me so. Why I say he is not yours, is he like you either in
face or mind?"

"And he is like--whom?"

Lady Bassett had lost all her courage by this time: she whimpered out,
"Like nobody except the gypsies."

"Bella, this is a subject which will part you and me for life unless we
can agree upon it--"

No reply, in words, from Lady Bassett.

"So please let us understand each other. Your son is not my son. Is
that what you look me in the face and tell me?"

"Charles, I never said _that._ How could he be my son, and not be
yours?"

And she raised her eyes, and looked him full in the face: nor fear nor
cringing now: the woman was majestic.

Sir Charles was a little alarmed in his turn; for his wife's soft eyes
flamed battle for the first time in her life.

"Now you talk sense," said he; "if he is yours, he is mine; and, as he
is certainly yours, this is a very foolish conversation, which must not
be renewed, otherwise--"

"I shall be insulted by my own husband?"

"I think it very probable. And, as I do not choose you to be insulted,
nor to think yourself insulted, I forbid you ever to recur to this
subject."

"I will obey, Charles; but let me say one word first. When I was alone
in London, and hardly sensible, might not this child have been imposed
upon me and you? I'm sure he was."

"By whom?"

"How can I tell? I was alone--that woman in the house had a bad
face--the gypsies do these things, I've heard."

"The gypsies! And why not the fairies?" said Sir Charles,
contemptuously. "Is that all you have to suggest--before we close the
subject forever?"

"Yes," said Lady Bassett sorrowfully. "I see you take me for a
mad-woman; but time will show. Oh that I could persuade you to detach
your affections from that boy--he will break your heart else--and rest
them on the children that resemble us in mind and features."

"These partialities are allowed to mothers; but a father must be just.
Reginald is my first-born; he came to me from Heaven at a time when I
was under a bitter trial, and from the day he was born till this day I
have been a happy man. It is not often a father owes so much to a son
as I do to my darling boy. He is dear to my heart in spite of his
faults; and now I pity him, as well as love him, since it seems he has
only one parent, poor little fellow!"

Lady Bassett opened her mouth to reply, but could not. She r