“And, Leonard,” continued she, in a trembling, sad voice, “this is not all.  The punishment of punishments lies awaiting me still.  It is to see you suffer from my wrongdoing.  Yes, darling! they will speak shameful things of you, poor innocent child! as well as of me, who am guilty.  They will throw it in your teeth through life, that your mother was never married—­was not married when you were born——­”

“Were not you married?  Are not you a widow?” asked he abruptly, for the first time getting anything like a clear idea of the real state of the case.

“No!  May God forgive me, and help me!” exclaimed she, as she saw a strange look of repugnance cloud over the boy’s face, and felt a slight motion on his part to extricate himself from her hold.  It was as slight, as transient as it could be—­over in an instant.  But she had taken her hands away, and covered up her face with them as quickly—­covered up her face in shame before her child; and in the bitterness of her heart she was wailing out, “Oh! would to God I had died—­that I had died as a baby—­that I had died as a little baby hanging at my mother’s breast!”

“Mother,” said Leonard, timidly putting his hand on her arm; but she shrank from him, and continued her low, passionate wailing.  “Mother,” said he, after a pause coming nearer, though she saw it not—­“mammy darling,” said he, using the caressing name, which he had been trying to drop as not sufficiently manly, “mammy, my own, own dear, dear darling mother, I don’t believe them; I don’t, I don’t, I don’t, I don’t!” He broke out into a wild burst of crying as he said this.  In a moment her arms were round the boy, and she was hushing him up like a baby on her bosom.  “Hush, Leonard!  Leonard, be still, my child!  I have been too sudden with you!—­I have done you harm—­oh!  I have done you nothing but harm,” cried she, in a tone of bitter self-reproach.

“No, mother,” said he, stopping his tears, and his eyes blazing out with earnestness; “there never was such a mother as you have been to me, and I won’t believe any one who says it.  I won’t; and I’ll knock them down if they say it again, I will!” He clenched his fist, with a fierce, defiant look on his face.

“You forget, my child,” said Ruth, in the sweetest, saddest tone that ever was heard, “I said it of myself; I said it because it was true.”  Leonard threw his arms tight round her and hid his face against her bosom.  She felt him pant there like some hunted creature.  She had no soothing comfort to give him.  “Oh, that she and he lay dead!”

At last, exhausted, he lay so still and motionless, that she feared to look.  She wanted him to speak, yet dreaded his first words.  She kissed his hair, his head, his very clothes; murmuring low, inarticulate, and moaning sounds.

“Leonard,” said she, “Leonard, look up at me!  Leonard, look up!” But he only clung the closer, and hid his face the more.

“My boy!” said she, “what can I do or say?  If I tell you never to mind it—­that it is nothing—­I tell you false.  It is a bitter shame and a sorrow that I have drawn down upon you.  A shame, Leonard, because of me, your mother; but, Leonard, it is no disgrace or lowering of you in the eyes of God.”  She spoke now as if she had found the clue which might lead him to rest and strength at last.