her knows
nothing of the catastrophe yet."

If it were possible to keep her ignorant of it! But that could not be.
She read trouble in my face, as clearly as one sees a thunder-cloud in
the sky, and she could not rest till she had fathomed it. After she and
our guest had left us, my father lingered only a few minutes. He was not
a man that cared for drinking much wine, with no companion but me, and
he soon pushed the decanters from him.

"You are as dull as a beetle to-night, Martin," he said. "I think I will
go and see how your mother and Mrs. Murray get along together."

He went his way, and I went mine--up into my own room, where I should be
alone to think over things. It was a pleasant room, and had been mine
from my boyhood. There were some ugly old pictures still hanging against
the walls, which I could not find in my heart to take down. The model of
a ship I had carved with my penknife, the sails of which had been made
by Julia, occupied the top shelf over my books. The first pistol I had
ever possessed lay on the same shelf. It was my own den, my nest, my
sanctuary, my home within the home. I could not think of myself being
quite at home anywhere else.

Of late I had been awakened in the night two or three times, and found
my mother standing at my bedside, with her thin, transparent fingers
shading the light from my eyes. When I remonstrated with her she had
kissed me, smoothed the clothes about me, and promised meekly to go back
to bed. Did she visit me every night? and would there come a time when
she could not visit me?

CHAPTER THE EIGHTEENTH.

BROKEN OFF.

As I asked myself this question, with an unerring premonition that the
time would soon come when my mother and I would be separated, I heard
her tapping lightly at the door. She was not in the habit of leaving her
guests, and I was surprised and perplexed at seeing her.

"Your father and Mrs. Murray are having a game of chess," she said,
answering my look of astonishment. "We can be alone together half an
hour. And now tell me what is the matter? There is something going wrong
with you."

She sank down weariedly into a chair, and I knelt down beside her. It
was almost harder to tell her than to tell Julia; but it was worse than
useless to put off the evil moment. Better for her to hear all from me
before a whisper reached her from any one else.

"Johanna came here," she continued, "with a face as grave as a judge,
and asked for Julia