entity.
As yet I have been able to do but little. Let me add, Mackey is not my
real name."

"What is your real name?" questioned Mrs. Ruthven.

"I will reveal that later, when I have taken the proper steps in law to
obtain the vast property which is rightfully coming to me. You see, when
I disappeared, so to speak, nearly eleven years ago, my property went
into the hands of distant relatives, and they hate to give it up, and
are just as anxious to prove me an impostor as you seem to be."

"I am not anxious to prove you an impostor, Dr. Mackey; my heart is
wrapped up in Jack, that is all. If he is your son, I will rejoice that
he will be well off."

"I don't want to be rich; I would rather stay with you," put in our hero
quickly, and he meant what he said.

"Your affection for your foster mother does you credit, Jack," said the
doctor smoothly.

"She has been the best of mothers to me; so why shouldn't I love her?"

"True, my son, true. But it is strange that you have no warm feeling for
me--such as I have for you."

"You are a stranger to me."

"I trust your feeling towards me changes, for I want my only son to love
me."

At this Jack was silent, and instead of looking at the man he looked at
Mrs. Ruthven and at Marion. Then, unable to control his feelings, he
rushed from the room, mounted the stairs, and burst into his own
apartment, where he threw himself on the bed, wet as he was, to give
himself up to his misery.

"I don't want that man for a father!" he cried, over and over again,
half tearfully and with set teeth. "I don't want him! He isn't a bit
like anybody I could love! Oh, how I wish I had never set eyes on him!"

"It is a great shock to Jack, and to all of us," was Mrs. Ruthven's
comment, after the lad was gone.

"My reception here has been a great shock to me," said the doctor
bluntly. "My own son runs away from me."

"He had some trouble with you a couple of weeks ago."

"Pooh, that was nothing! I had almost forgotten it."

"Jack does not forget such things easily. Moreover, he is slow to make
friends with anybody."

"He doesn't know the chances he is throwing away. Were it not that he is
my son, and my heart goes out toward him, I would never bother him."

"What chances has he?" asked Marion.

"I shall be very rich; and, not only that, our family has a famous name
in England, with a title attached. Jack may some day be a nobleman."

"I reckon he'd rather be an American," answered