“If you don’t intend to take him from me, what was the use of telling me this dreadful story?” impatiently asked Mrs. Fitzgerald.

“I felt compelled to do it on Eulalia’s account,” responded Mrs. King.

“Ah, yes!” sighed the lady.  “How disappointed he will be, poor fellow!” After a brief pause, she added, vehemently:  “But whatever you may say, he is my son.  I never will give him up.  He has slept in my arms.  I have sung him to sleep.  I taught him all his little hymns and songs.  He loves me; and I will never consent to take a second place in his affections.”

“You shall not be asked to do so, dear lady,” meekly replied Mrs. King.  “I will, as in duty bound, take any place you choose to assign me.”

Somewhat disarmed by this humility, Mrs. Fitzgerald said, in a softened tone:  “I pity you, Mrs. King.  You have had a great deal of trouble, and this is a very trying situation you are in.  But it would break my heart to give up Gerald.  And then you must see, of course, what an embarrassing position it would place me in before the world.”

“I see no reason why the world should know anything about it,” rejoined Mrs. King.  “For Gerald’s sake, as well as our own, it is very desirable that the secret should be kept between ourselves.”

“You may safely trust my pride for that,” she replied.

“Do you think your father ought to be included in our confidence,” inquired Mrs. King.

“No indeed,” she replied, hastily.  “He never can bear to hear my poor husband mentioned.  Besides, he has had the gout a good deal lately, and is more irritable than usual.”

As she rose to go, Mrs. King said:  “Then, with the exception of Eulalia, everything remains outwardly as it was.  Can you forgive me?  I do believe I was insane with misery; and you don’t know how I have been haunted with remorse.”

“You must have suffered terribly,” rejoined Mrs. Fitzgerald, evading a direct answer to the question.  “But we had better not talk any more about it now.  I am bewildered, and don’t know what to think.  Only one thing is fixed in my mind:  Gerald is my son.”

They parted politely, but with coldness on Mrs. Fitzgerald’s side.  There had arisen in her mind a double dislike toward Mrs. King, as the first love of her husband, and as the mother of the elegant young man who was to her an object of pride as well as fondness.  But her chagrin was not without compensation.  Mrs. King’s superior wealth and beauty had been felt by her as somewhat overshadowing; and the mortifying circumstances she had now discovered in her history seemed, in her imagination, to bring her down below a level with herself.  She and Gerald sat up late into the night, talking over this strange disclosure.  She was rather jealous of the compassion he expressed for Mrs. King, and of his admiration for her manners and character; though they mutually declared, again and again, that they could realize no change whatever in their relation to each other.