With that scant courtesy Wollaston Lee resumed his race homeward, and Maria went her own way.

It was that very night, after Harry Edgham had returned from his call upon Ida Slome, that he told Maria.  Maria, as usual, had gone to bed, but she was not asleep.  Maria heard his hand on her door-knob, and his voice calling out, softly:  “Are you asleep, dear?”

“No,” responded Maria.

Then her father entered and approached the child staring at him from her white nest.  The room was full of moonlight, and Maria’s face looked like a nucleus of innocence upon which it centred.  Harry leaned over his little daughter and kissed her.

“Father has got something to tell you, precious,” he said.

Maria hitched away a little from him, and made no reply.

“Ida, Miss Slome, tells me that she thinks you know, and so I made up my mind I had better tell you, and not wait any longer, although I shall not take any decisive step before—­before November.  What would you say if father should bring home a new mother for his little girl, dear?”

“I should say I would rather have Aunt Maria,” replied Maria, decisively.  She choked back a sob.

“I’ve got nothing to say against Aunt Maria,” said Harry.  “She’s been very kind to come here, and she’s done all she could, but—­well, I think in some ways, some one else—­Father thinks you will be much happier with another mother, dear.”

“No, I sha’n’t.”

Harry hesitated.  The child’s voice sounded so like her dead mother’s that he felt a sudden guilt, and almost terror.

“But if father were happier—­you want father to be happy, don’t you, dear?” he asked, after a little.

Then Maria began to sob in good earnest.  She threw her arms around her father’s neck.  “Yes, father, I do want you to be happy,” she whispered, brokenly.

“If father’s little girl were large enough to keep his house for him, and were through school, father would never think of taking such a step,” said Harry Edgham, and he honestly believed what he said.  For the moment his old love of life seemed to clutch him fast, and Ida Slome’s radiant visage seemed to pale.

“Oh, father,” pleaded Maria.  “Aunt Maria would marry you, and I would a great deal rather have her.”

“Nonsense,” said Harry Edgham, laughing, with a glance towards the door.

“Yes, she would, father; that was the reason she got her pompadour.”

Harry laughed again, but softly, for he was afraid of Aunt Maria overhearing.  “Nonsense, dear,” he said again.  Then he kissed Maria in a final sort of way.  “It will be all for the best,” he said, “and we shall all be happier.  Father doesn’t think any the less of you, and never will, and he is never going to forget your own dear mother; but it is all for the best, the way he has decided.  Now, good-night, darling, try to go to sleep, and don’t worry about anything.”