rst, sorrow and a sense of self-reproach were his only
sentiments; but gradually another feeling supervened. There is not
anything which supplies to the heart the want of being cared for.
There is that companionship in being loved, without which life is the
dreariest of all solitudes. As we are obliged to refer all our actions
to a standard of right and wrong, so by a like rule all our emotions
must be brought before another court,--the heart that loves us; and he
who has not this appeal is a wretched outlaw! This Layton now began to
feel, and every day strengthened the conviction. The last few lines of
the letter, too, gave an unspeakable interest to the whole. They ran
thus:--

"I know not what change has come over my life, or is to come, but I am
to be separated from my mother, intrusted to a guardian I have never
seen till now, and sent I know not whither. All that I am told is that
our narrow fortune requires I should make an effort for my own support.
I am grateful to the adversity that snatches me from a life of thought
to one of labor. The weariness of work will be far easier to bear than
the repinings of indolence. Self-reproach will be less poignant, too,
when not associated with self-indulgence; and, better than all, a
thousand times better, I shall feel in my toil some similitude to him
whom I love,--feel, when my tired brain seeks rest, some unseen thread
links my weariness to his, and blends our thoughts together in our
dreams, fellow-laborers at least in life, if not lovers!"

When he had read thus far, and was still contemplating the lines, a
small slip, carefully sealed in two places, fell from the letter. It was
inscribed "My Secret." Alfred tore it open eagerly. The contents were
very brief, and ran thus:--

"She whom I had believed to be my mother is not so. She is nothing to
me. I am an orphan. I know nothing of those belonging to me, nor of
myself, any more than that my name is _not_, 'Clara Morris.'"

Layton's first impulse, as he read, was to exclaim, "Thank God, the dear
child has no tie to this woman!" The thought of her being her daughter
was maddening. And then arose the question to his mind, by what link had
they been united hitherto? Mrs. Morris had been ever to him a mysterious
personage, for whom he had invented numberless histories, not always to
her advantage. But why or through what circumstances this girl had been
associated with her fortunes, was a knot he could find no clew to. T