usly.

'Have family prayer.'

If a bombshell had suddenly alighted on the table and there exploded,
there would have been, no doubt, more feeling of fright, but not more
of shocked surprise. Dumb silence followed. Angry eyes were directed
towards the speaker from the top and from the bottom of the table. Miss
Frere cast down hers with the inward thought, 'Oh, you foolish, foolish
fellow! what did you do that for, and spoil everything!' Pitt waited a
little.

'It is duty,' he said. 'You yourselves will grant me that.'

'And you fancy it is _your_ duty to remind us of ours!' said his
father, with contained scorn.

The mother's agitation was violent--so violent that she had difficulty
to command herself. What it was that moved her so painfully she could
not have told; her thoughts were in too much of a whirl. Between anger,
and fear, and something else, she was in the greatest confusion, and
not able to utter a syllable. Betty sat internally railing at Pitt's
folly.

'The only question is, Is it duty?--in either case,' the son said
steadfastly.

'Exactly!' said his father. 'Well, you have done yours; and I will do
mine.'

His wife wondered at his calmness, and guessed that it was studied.
Neither of them was prepared for Pitt's next word.

'Will you?' he said simply. 'And will you let me make a beginning now?
Because I am going away?'

'Do what you like,' said the older man, with indescribable expression.
Betty interpreted it to be restrained rage. His wife thought it was a
moved conscience, or mere policy and curiosity; she could not tell
which. The words were enough, however, whatever had moved them. Pitt
took a Bible and read, still sitting at the table, the Parable of the
Talents; and then he kneeled down. The elder Dallas never stirred.
Betty knelt at once. Mrs. Dallas sat still at first, but then slipped
from her chair to the floor and buried her face in her hands, where
tears that were exceedingly bitter flowed beyond all her power to
hinder them. For Pitt was praying, and to his mother's somewhat shocked
astonishment, not in any words from a book, but in words--where did he
get them?--that broke her heart. They were solemn and sweet, tender and
simple; there was neither boldness nor shyness in them, although there
was a frankness at which Mrs. Dallas wondered, along with the
tenderness that quite subdued her.

The third one kneeling there was moved differently. The fountain of her
tears was not touc