ty for so
doing. My mother died at the age of sixty-five. I nursed her tenderly
through a long and painful illness, and closed her eyes in death. My
father and I were now left alone in our home. He was several years older
than my mother. The infirmities of age were coming fast upon him."

CHAPTER XVII.

PENITENT, AND FORGIVEN.

On a stormy evening, like this, we were sitting together in this room
when our attention was arrested by a timid knock at the door. My father
opened the door, and I heard some one, in a feeble voice, ask permission
to enter the house. My father conducted the stranger in, and gave him a
seat by our cheerful fire. When the stranger entered the room, and I
gained a view of his face, I at once knew that I stood face to face with
George Almont. When I suddenly pronounced his name, my father made a
hasty movement as if to speak with anger, but I gave him an imploring
look and he remained silent. Although greatly changed, it was,
nevertheless, George Almont who was now in our presence. After a few
moments of silence, for after my exclamatory utterance of his name,
neither of us had spoken, he turned his eyes, in which the light of
disease painfully burned, and said,--'You do well not to reproach me;
the time for that is past, for I am, as you may see, on the verge of the
grave. I have striven with disease, that I might reach this place, and
if possible, obtain your forgiveness 'ere my eyes shall close in death.
I know I have darkened a life, which, but for me, might have been bright
and joyous. It is too much for me to expect your forgiveness, yet I
would hear you pronounce that blessed word before I die. You may _now_
believe me when I say, that it was my love for you which led me to
deceive you. Knowing my wife's dread of any publicity being attached to
her name, I thought the knowledge that I had a living wife would never
reach you. Of the sinfulness of my conduct I did not at that time pause
to think. I now sincerely thank my wife for preventing a marriage which
in the sight of God, must have been but mockery. I now speak truly when
I say to you, I never loved my wife; I married her for money. As I had
no affection for her, my former habits of dissipation soon regained
their hold on me. It will afford me some comfort to know that I have
made strictly true confession to you. I have not, to my knowledge, a
living relation in the wide world; and, till I met with you, I knew not
the meaning o