aria said, in a
bewildered sort of way. It was the cry of the woman, the primitive
cry of the primitive scape-goat of Creation. Already Maria began to
feel the necessity of fitting her little shoulders to the blame of
life, which she had inherited from her Mother Eve, but she was as yet
bewildered by the necessity.

"Ain't it your father that's going to marry her?" inquired Wollaston,
fiercely.

"I don't want him to marry her any more than you do," said Maria. "I
don't want her for a mother."

"I told you how it would come out, if I asked her," cried the boy,
still heaping the blame upon the girl.

"I would enough sight rather marry you than my father, if I were the
teacher," said Maria, and her blue eyes looked into Wollaston's with
the boldness of absolute guilelessness.

"Hush!" responded Wollaston, with a gesture of disdain. "Who'd want
you? You're nothing but a girl, anyway."

With that scant courtesy Wollaston Lee resumed his race homeward, and
Maria went her own way.

It was that very night, after Harry Edgham had returned from his call
upon Ida Slome, that he told Maria. Maria, as usual, had gone to bed,
but she was not asleep. Maria heard his hand on her door-knob, and
his voice calling out, softly: "Are you asleep, dear?"

"No," responded Maria.

Then her father entered and approached the child staring at him from
her white nest. The room was full of moonlight, and Maria's face
looked like a nucleus of innocence upon which it centred. Harry
leaned over his little daughter and kissed her.

"Father has got something to tell you, precious," he said.

Maria hitched away a little from him, and made no reply.

"Ida, Miss Slome, tells me that she thinks you know, and so I made up
my mind I had better tell you, and not wait any longer, although I
shall not take any decisive step before--before November. What would
you say if father should bring home a new mother for his little girl,
dear?"

"I should say I would rather have Aunt Maria," replied Maria,
decisively. She choked back a sob.

"I've got nothing to say against Aunt Maria," said Harry. "She's been
very kind to come here, and she's done all she could, but--well, I
think in some ways, some one else--Father thinks you will be much
happier with another mother, dear."

"No, I sha'n't."

Harry hesitated. The child's voice sounded so like her dead mother's
that he felt a sudden guilt, and almost terror.

"But if father were happier--you want f