a few moments alone with Maria.
So Evelyn went off up-stairs, after teary kisses and good-nights, and
Maria was left alone with her father in the parlor.

"You are not well, father?" Maria said, immediately after Evelyn had
closed the door.

"No, dear," replied Harry, simply.

Maria retained her self-composure very much as her mother might have
done. A quick sense of the necessity of aiding her father, of
supporting him spiritually, came over her.

"What doctor have you seen, father?" she asked.

"The doctor here and three specialists in New York."

"And they all agreed?"

"Yes, dear."

Maria looked interrogatively at her father. Her face was very white
and shocked, but it did not quiver. Harry answered the look.

"I may have to give up almost any day now," he said, with an odd
sigh, half of misery, half of relief.

"Does Ida know?" asked Maria.

"No, dear, she does not suspect. I thought there was no need of
distressing her. I wanted to tell you while I was able, because--"
Harry hesitated, then he continued: "Father wanted to tell you how
sorry he was not to make any better provision for you," he said,
pitifully. "He didn't want you to think it was because he cared any
the less for you. But--soon after I married Ida--well, I realized how
helpless she would be, especially after Evelyn was born, and I had my
life insured for her benefit. A few years after I tried to get a
second policy for your benefit, but it was too late. Father hasn't
been well for quite a long time."

"I hope you don't think I care about any money," Maria cried, with
sudden passion. "I can take care of myself. It is _you_ I think of."
Maria began to weep, then restrained herself, but she looked
accusingly and distressedly at her father.

"I had to settle the house on her, too," said Harry, painfully. "But
I felt sure at the time--she said so--that you would always have your
home here."

"That is all right, father," said Maria.

"All father can do for his first little girl, the one he loves best
of all," said Harry, "is to leave her a little sum he has saved and
put in the savings-bank here in her name. It is not much, dear."

"It is more than I want. I don't want anything. All I want is you!"
cried Maria. She had an impulse to rush to her father, to cling about
his neck and weep her very heart out, but she restrained herself. She
saw how unutterably weary her father looked, and she realized that
any violent emotion, even of lo