“Dare—­you?”

Doris stretched her arms as if pushing aside every obstacle.

“I do,” she said.  “I am not a daring woman:  I am a weak and fearful one—­this, though, I dare!”

“But the father——­” Angela whispered.

“The—­father——­” Doris’s eyes flamed.

“But he may, as you say, claim the child.”  Angela hastened breathlessly as one running.

“How could he, if I did not know which child was his?”

The blinding light began to point the way clearer, now, to the older woman.

“It’s—­unheard of,” she murmured, “and yet——­”

“I will write to Thornton, offer to take his child,” Doris was pleading, rather than explaining.  “I think at the first he will agree to the proposal—­what else can he do?  The shock—­remember, he does not even know that a child is expected!  Dare we refuse Meredith’s child this only and desperate chance—­knowing what we do?”

Angela made no reply.  She was letting go one after another of her rigid beliefs.  Again Doris spoke, again she pleaded: 

“I will abide by your decision, Sister, but only after you have gone to the chapel—­and seen the way.  I will wait here.”

Angela rose stiffly, holding to her cross as if it were a physical support.  With bowed head she passed from the room and Doris sat down thinking; demanding justice.

A half hour passed before steps were heard in the hall.  Doris stood up, her eyes fixed on the door.

Sister Angela entered, and in her arms, wrapped in the same blanket, were two sleeping babies wearing the plain clothing that Ridge House kept in store for emergencies.  Doris ran forward; she bent over the small creatures.

“Which?” Nature leaped forth in that one palpitating word—­it was the last claim of blood.

“I—­forgot—­when I brought them to you.  We have all—­forgot.  It is the only way—­the chance.”

Doris took both children in her arms.

“I shall name them Joan and Nancy,” she whispered, “for my mother and grandmother.  Joan and Nancy—­Thornton!”

Then she kissed them, and it was given to her at that moment to forget her bitter hatred.

CHAPTER IV

“Just as much of doubt as bade us plant a surer foot upon the sun-road.”

Doris Fletcher had no turning-back in her nature.  She never reached a goal but by patient effort to understand, and she was able to close her eyes to by-paths.

Having adopted the children, having foregone her prejudices—­good and evil—­having set her feet upon the way, she meant to go unfalteringly on, and because doubts would assail her at times, she held the surer to her task.

She remained a month at Ridge House.  She wrote to Thornton and in due time his reply came.

Apparently he had written while bewildered and shocked.  The old arrogant tone was gone.  He accepted what Doris offered and set aside a generous sum of money for his child’s expenses.