have done him a grievous wrong
one day--I never knew who she was; but I am certain that it was so; and
that soured and embittered him. He was revenging himself on that other
woman, I used to think, when he was cruel to me."

Janetta dared not speak.

"I did not mind his cruelty when it meant nothing but bodily pain, you
know, my dear," Mrs. Brand continued patiently. "But it was harder for
me to bear when it came to what might be called moral things. You see I
loved him, and I could not say him nay. If he told me to lie, I had to
do it. I never forgave myself for the lies I told at his bidding. And if
he were here to tell me to do the same things I should do them still. If
he had turned Mohammedan, and told me to trample on the Bible or the
Cross, as I have read in missionary books that Christians have sometimes
been bribed to do, I should have obeyed him. I was his body and soul,
and all my misery has come out of that."

"How?" Janetta asked.

"I brought Wyvis up on a lie," the mother answered, her face growing
woefully stern and rigid as she mentioned his name, "and it has been my
punishment that he has always hated lies. I have trembled to hear him
speak against falsehood--to catch his look of scorn when he began to see
that his father did not speak truth. Very early he made me understand
that he would never be likely to forgive us for the deception we
practiced on him. For his good, you will say; but ah, my dear, deception
is never for anybody's good. I never forgave myself, and Wyvis will
never forgive me. And yet he is my child. Now you see the happiness that
lies in having children."

Janetta tried to dissipate the morbid terror of the past, the morbid
dread of Wyvis' condemnation, which hung like a shadow over the poor
woman's mind, but she was far from being successful.

"You do not know," was all that Mrs. Brand would say. "You do not
understand." And then she broke out more passionately--

"I have done him harm all his life. His misery has been my fault. You
heard him tell me so. It is true: there is no use denying it. And he
knows it."

"He spoke in a moment of anger: he did not know what he said."

"Oh, yes, he did, and he meant it too. I have heard him say a similar
thing before. You see it was I that brought about this wretched marriage
of his--because I pitied this woman, and thought her case was like my
own--that she loved Wyvis as I loved Mark Brand. I brought that
marriage about, and Wyvis