bbing cry. "Oh,
John, you don't know how true that is! He said to me only yesterday,
'You have always told me everything, mother. There has never been any
secret between us.' Oh! John, John, only think of having that said to
me, and knowing what I know!"

"Well, Elinor; believe me, my dear, there is but one thing to do. The
boy is a good boy, full of love and kindness."

"Oh, isn't he, John? the best boy, the dearest----"

"And adores his mother, as a boy should," John got up from his chair and
walked about the room for a little, and then he came behind her and put
his hand on her shoulder. "Tell him, Elinor: my dear Nelly, as if I had
never said a word on the subject before, I beseech you tell him, trust
him fully, even now, at the eleventh hour."

She raised her head with a quivering, wistful smile. "The moment the
trial is over, the moment it is over! I give you my word, John."

"Do not wait till it is over, do it now; to-night when he comes home."

She began to tremble so that John Tatham was alarmed--and kept looking
at him with an imploring look, her lips quivering and every line in her
countenance. "Oh, not to-night. Spare me to-night! After the trial;
after my part of it. At least--after--after--oh, give me till to-morrow
to think of it!"

"My dear Elinor, I count for nothing in it. I am not your judge; I am
your partisan, you know, whatever you do. But I am sure it will be the
better done, and even the easier done, the sooner you do it."

"I will--I will: at the very latest the day after I have done my part at
the trial. Is not that enough to think of at one time, for a poor woman
who has never stood up before the public in all her life, never had a
question put to her? Oh, John! oh, John!"

"Elinor, Elinor! you are too sensible a woman to make a fuss about a
simple duty like this."

"There speaks the man who has stood before the world all his life, and
is not afraid of any public," she said, with a tremulous laugh. But she
had won her moment's delay, and thus was victorious after a fashion, as
it was her habit to be.

I do not know that young Philip much amused himself at Woolwich that
day. He did and he did not. He could not help being interested in
all he saw, and he liked the Marshalls well enough, and in ordinary
circumstances would have entered very heartily into any sight-seeing.
But he kept thinking all the time what his mother was doing, and
wondering over the mysterious business which was