“Confidence in what respect, Perry?”

The young man walked to his father and knelt at his knee and clasped his hand.  Even then Perry saw the shadow gather in that kind man’s brow, as if he perceived the demon in his son.

“Before I make a lady my wife, father, I want every mystery of my life related.  I have always heard that my mother died.  Where is she buried?”

There was a long pause.

“She is not dead,” said Judge Whaley, without any inflection, “except to me.”

“Not dead, father?” asked the son, with throbbing temples.  “Oh, why have I been so deceived?  Were you unhappy?”

“I thought I was happy,” said the Judge huskily; “that was long my impression.”

“And my mother—­was she, too, happy when you were so?”

“No.”

The young man rose and walked to the wainscot and back again.  “Dear father, I see the origin of the shadow upon your brow.  Why was I not told before?  Perhaps the son of two unhappy parents might have brought them together again, if for no other congenial end, than that he was their only son!”

The Judge raised his eyes to the imploring eyes of the younger man.  The shadow never was so deep upon his brow as Perry saw it now; it was the shadow of a long inured agony intensified by a dread judicial sympathy.

“You are not my son!” he said.

Perry’s mouth opened, but not to articulate.  He stretched out his hands to touch something, and that only which he could not reach struck and stunned him; he had fallen senseless to the floor.

When Perry returned to knowledge he was lying upon the carpet, a cloak under his head, and his father, walking up and down, stooped over him frequently to look into his face with a tender, yet suffering interest.  The young man did not move, and only revealed his wakefulness at last by raising his hand to check a relieving flow of tears.

“My dear boy,” finally said Judge Whaley, himself shedding tears, “I had supposed that you already knew something of the tragedy of my life.”

“Never,” moaned Perry.

“Then, forgive me; I should myself have gradually told you the tale; it might have come up with your growth, inwoven like a mere ghost story.  Did no playmate, no older intimate, not one of your age striving for the bar, ever whisper to you that I had been deceived, and that you, my only comfort, were the fruit of the deception?”

“No, sir.”  Perry’s tears seemed to dry in the recollection.  “We were both gentlemen—­at least, after we reached this world.  No one ever insulted me nor you!  I humbly thank God that, discredited as I may have been, my conduct to all was so considerate that no one could obtrude such a truth upon me.  Is it the truth?  O father!—­I must call you so! it is the only word I know—­is this, at last, one of the dreadful visions of diseased sleep or of insanity?  Who am I?  What was my mother?  I can bear it all, for now I have seen why you never loved me.”