eveloped, Cuthbert seemed to rouse himself from his
stupor and a different expression crossed his features.

Skilfully the part played by General Laurance in bribing Peleg, and
returning the letters of the wretched wife, the disgraceful threats,
the offers to buy up and cancel her conjugal claims, were all
presented.

When the grandmother departed, and the child-wife secretly made her
way to New York, seeking service that would secure her bread, and
still hopeful of her husband's return, Cuthbert grasped his father's
arm and hissed in his ear:

"You deceived me! You told me she went with that villain to
California to hide her disgrace!"

Cowed and powerless, the old man sat, recognizing the faithful
portraiture of his own dark schemes in those early days of the
trouble, and growing numb with a vague prophetic dread that the
foundations of the world were crumbling away.

His son suddenly drew his chair a little forward and sat down, his
elbow on his knee, his head on his hand; his gaze fixed on the woman
who had contrived to reproduce even the fall that caused her removal
to the hospital.

The ensuing scene represented the young mother, sitting on a cot in
the hospital, with a babe lying across her knees, and the storm of
horror, hate, and defiance with which she spurned Peleg from her,
calling on heaven to defend her and her baby, and denouncing the
treachery of General Laurance who had bribed Peterson to insult and
defame her.

As he was dragged from the apartment, vowing that neither she nor her
child should be permitted to enjoy the name to which they were
entitled, the feeble woman, shorn of her brown locks, and wearing a
close cap, lifted her infant, and with streaming eyes implored heaven
to defend it and its hapless mother from cruel persecution.

In the wonderful power with which she proclaimed her deathless
loyalty to the husband of her love, and her conviction that God would
interpose to shield his helpless child, the audience recognized the
fervour and pathos of the rendition, and the applause that greeted
her, as she bowed sobbing over her baby, told how the hearts of her
hearers thrilled.

The curtain fell, and Cuthbert's eyes, gleaming like steel, turned to
his father's countenance.

"Is that true? Dare you deny it?"

The old man only stared blankly at the carpet on the floor, and his
son's fingers closed like a vice around his arm.

"You have practised an infernal imposture upon me! You t