But there was, after all, a cloud that cast a shadow upon the happiness of the Lindsays,—­a cloud of which they rarely spoke, but about which each of them thought a great deal:  they were childless.  In the early months of their married life they had been wont to talk of their prospective children, and to say what they would do and what they would not do when they had a child; but when the months lengthened into years, and still there was neither son nor daughter to carry out their plans, they gradually left off alluding to these things, though they never ceased to hope that they might some day have a child.

At first the cloud was very small, so that they refused to recognize its presence; but every day it lengthened and broadened, until at last it darkened the brightest moments of their life.  For each knew that the thoughts of the other ran much upon this one thing, and each was troubled that the other should brood upon it.  And then, in course of time, they grew to be a little morbid.  It seemed to them as if by their friends who had children they were regarded with an ill-concealed, patronizing pity.  They felt an unreasonable antipathy toward young parents who loved to discourse of the ailments and accomplishments of their babies, and they even avoided the houses of many acquaintances wherein, they knew from experience, the conversation must be principally devoted to some young hopeful.

But after three winters had come and gone since their marriage, Edward began to reflect more and more seriously upon a scheme of which he had often thought as a relief from this unsatisfactory state of things, and one April morning he broached it at the breakfast-table.

“Ellen,” he asked abruptly, “how would you like to adopt a child?”

His wife arrested the coffee-pot over a half-filled cup and gazed at him with sparkling eyes.

“Oh, Edward!” she exclaimed, as if a reply were quite unnecessary.  “Why have we never thought of that before?”

“I can’t imagine,” he rejoined shamelessly.  “But I happened to think yesterday of the unlimited possibilities before such a child as we should adopt.  You see, we could make sure of a vigorous constitution, of sturdy and respectable parents, of physical beauty, of any combination of good qualities, if we only exercised proper care in our selection.  And then, with the training and education we should give a child of ours—­”

“Of course we should always consider it our own child,” said Ellen.

“Of course,” assented her husband.  “Perhaps,” he added, “it would be better that he should never know the facts of the case.”

“Oh, no!  I should never be happy myself if I felt I was deceiving the child,” she protested.

“Well, it would be rather a difficult thing to manage, anyway, his—­”

“Or her,” interrupted Ellen.

“Whichever you may prefer,” Edward returned, with prompt liberality.  “I was thinking of a boy, simply because I realize that a boy’s chances of reaching distinction are much greater than a girl’s.”