“Oh, no!  Ralph; good lawyers never lie, and I’m a good lawyer.”

“An’ when can I see ’em?  Can I go to ’em to-night?  I don’t b’lieve I can wait,—­I don’t b’lieve I can!”

“Ralph!  Ralph! you promised to be quiet and reasonable.  There, be seated and wait till you hear us through.  There is something better yet for you to know.  Now, who do you suppose your mother is?  She lives in Scranton.”

Ralph sat, for a moment, in stupid wonder, staring at Sharpman.  Then a brilliant thought, borne on by instinct, impulse, strong desire, flashed like a ray of sunlight, into his mind, and he started to his feet again, exclaiming:—­

“Mrs. Burnham! it can’t be! oh, it can’t be! tell me, is it Mrs. Burnham?”

Craft and Sharpman exchanged quick glances of amazement, and the latter said, impressively:—­

“Yes, Ralph, Mrs. Burnham is your mother.”

The boy stood for another moment, as if lost in thought; then he cried out, suddenly:  “And Mr. Burnham, he—­he was my—­my father!” and he sank back into his chair, with a sudden weakness in his limbs, and a mist before his eyes.

For many minutes no one spoke.  Then Ralph asked, quietly,—­

“Does—­does she know?”

“Now, Ralph,” said Sharpman, “now comes the strangest part of the story.  Your mother believes you to be dead.  She believes that you perished in the accident at Cherry Brook, and has mourned for you ever since the time of that disaster.”

“Am I the boy—­am I the Ralph she lost?”

“The very one, but we cannot make her think so.  I went to her, myself, this morning, and told her that you are alive.  I told her who you are, and all about you.  She knows you, but she will not believe that you are her son.  She wants better evidence than we can give to her, outside of the courts.”

“An’ won’t she never believe it? won’t she never take me?”

The boy’s voice and look revealed the sudden clashing of his hope.

“Oh, yes, Ralph! in time; I do not doubt that in good time she will recognize you and take you to her home.  She has so long believed you to be dead that it is hard for her to overcome the prejudice of that belief.”

Then another fear came into the lad’s mind.

“Are you sure,” he cried out, “that I am her boy? are you sure I’m the right one?”

“Oh, yes!” said the lawyer, assuringly, “oh, yes! there’s no mistake about that, there isn’t the shadow of a doubt about that.  We shall establish your identity beyond question; but we shall have to do it in the courts.  When it is once done no one can prevent you from taking the name and the property to which you are entitled and using them as you see fit.”

“But my mother!” said Ralph, anxiously, “my mother; she’s all I care about; I don’t want the property if I can’t have her.”

“And you shall have her, my boy.  Mrs. Burnham said to me this morning, that, until your claim was duly proved in a court of law, she would have no legal right to accept you as her son; but that, when your identity is once established in that way, she will receive you into her home and her heart with much joy.”