.

"I asked for you to come here," she said, her voice shaking, "to
introduce you to my eldest son, whom I have at last found"; she pressed
my hand. "But you have met him already; you saw him at the home of the
man who stole him, when you went there to inquire after his health."

"What does this mean?" demanded Milligan.

"That the man who is serving a sentence for robbing a church has made a
full confession. He has stated how he stole my baby and took it to Paris
and left it there. Here are the clothes that my child wore. It was this
good woman who brought up my son. Do you wish to read this confession.
Do you wish to examine these clothes?"

James Milligan looked at us as though he would liked to have strangled
us, then he turned on his heels. At the threshold he turned round and
said: "We'll see what the courts will think of this boy's story."

My mother, I may call her so now, replied quietly: "_You_ may take the
matter to the courts; I have not done so because you are my husband's
brother."

The door closed. Then, for the first time in my life, I kissed my mother
as she kissed me.

"Will you tell your mother that I kept the secret?" said Mattia, coming
up to us.

"You knew all, then?"

"I told Mattia not to speak of all this to you," said my mother, "for
though I did believe that you were my son, I had to have certain proofs,
and get Madame Barberin here with the clothes. How unhappy we should
have been if, after all, we had made a mistake. We have these proofs and
we shall never be parted again. You will live with your mother and
brother?" Then, pointing to Mattia and Lise, "and," she added, "with
those whom you loved when you were poor."

CHAPTER XXXIII

THE DREAM COME TRUE

Years have passed. I now live in the home of my ancestors, Milligan
Park. The miserable little wanderer who slept so often in a stable was
heir to an old historical castle. It is a beautiful old place about
twenty miles west of the spot where I jumped from the train to escape
from the police. I live here with my mother, my brother and my wife.

We are going to baptize our first child, little Mattia. To-night all
those who were my friends in my poorer days will meet under my roof to
celebrate the event and I am going to offer to each one as a little
token a copy of my "Memoirs," which for the last six months I have been
writing and which to-day I have received from the bookbinder.

This reunion of all our friends is a