choked me, and I couldn't go on eating my
dinner. He didn't seem like my dear father when he looked like that. I
always used to watch my father, and he seemed to make the day for me. If
he was sad, then I was sad; and if he was glad then I was happy all
over, until one day my stepmother noticed me and said: 'See, dear little
Elizabeth is trembling. You ought not to speak that way before her,
Charles.' And then father looked at me, and all suddenly I learned to
smile when I didn't feel like it. I smiled back to him just to let him
know it didn't matter what he did, I would love him anyhow!"

During the recital Reyburn had sat with courteous averted gaze as though
he would not trouble her with more of his presence than was absolutely
necessary. Now he gave her a swift glance.

Betty's eyes were off on distance, and she was talking from the depths
of her heart, great tears welling into her eyes. All at once she
remembered the stranger:

"I beg your pardon," she said, and brushed her hand across her eyes. "I
haven't gone over it to any one ever, and I forgot you would not be
interested in details."

"Please don't mind me. I am interested in every detail you are good
enough to give me. It all makes the background of the truth, you know,
and that is what I am after," said Reyburn, deeply touched. "I think you
are wonderful to tell me all this. I shall regard it most sacredly."

Betty flashed a look of gratitude at him, and noticed the sympathy in
his face. It almost unnerved her, but she went on:

"The oldest boy was named Bessemer, and he wasn't very good-looking. He
was very tall and awkward, and always falling over things. He had little
pale eyes, and hardly any chin. His teeth projected, too, and his hair
was light and very straight and thin. His mother didn't seem to love him
very much, even when he was a little boy. She bullied him and found
fault with him continually, and quite often I felt very sorry for him,
although I wasn't naturally attracted to him. He wasn't really
unpleasant to me. We got along very nicely, although I never had much to
do with him. There wasn't much to him.

"The other brother, Herbert, was handsome like his mother, only dark,
with black curly hair, black wicked eyes, and a big, loose, cruel mouth.
His mother just idolized him, and he knew it. He could make her do
anything on earth. He used to force Bessemer into doing wrong things,
too, things that he was afraid to do himself, because