“John loves to be caustic; he likes to vocalize his dyspepsia,” the old man muttered.  “Well, if it’s as serious as he seems to think, we may be spared the disgrace of a grandchild.”  Mrs. Wharton did not stir; there was something uncompromising in the rigid lines of her back and in her stiffly poised head.  “People of her kind always have children,” he continued, “and that’s what I told Bob.  I told him he was laying up trouble for himself.”

“Bob had more to him than we thought,” irrelevantly murmured the mother.

“More than we thought?” Hannibal shook his head.  “Not more than I thought.  I knew he had it in him; you were the one—­”

“No, no!  We both doubted.  Perhaps this girl read him.”

“Sure she read him!” snorted the father.  “She read his bank-book.  But I fooled her.”

“Do you remember when Bob was born?”

“Eh?”

“Do you remember?  I had trouble, too.”

Into Hannibal’s eyes came a slow and painful light of reminiscence.

“The doctors thought—­”

“Of course I remember!” her husband broke in.  “Those damned doctors said you’d never come through it.”

“Yes; I wasn’t strong.”

“But you did.  I was with you.  I fought for you.  I wouldn’t let you die.  Remember it?” The speaker moistened his lips.  “Why, I never forgot.”

“Bob is experiencing something like that to-night.”

Hannibal started, then he fumbled uncertainly for a cigar.  When he had it lighted he said, gruffly, “Well, it made a man of me; I hope it’ll help Bob.”

Still staring out across the glowing lights and the mysterious, inky blots that lay below her, Mrs. Wharton went on:  “You are thinking only of Bob, but that girl is suffering all I suffered that night, and I’m thinking of her, too.  She is offering her life for the life of a little child, just as I offered mine.”

There was a silence, then Hannibal looked up to find his wife standing over him with face strangely humble.  Her eyes were appealing, her frail figure was shaking wretchedly.

“My dear!” he cried, rising.

“I can’t keep it up, Hannibal.  I can’t pretend any longer.  It’s Bob’s baby and it’s ours—­” Disregarding his denial, she ran on, swiftly:  “I wanted more children, but I couldn’t have them, so I’ve starved myself all these years.  You can’t understand, but I’m lonely, Hannibal, terribly lonely and sad.  Bob grew up and went away, and all we had left was money.  The dollars piled up; year by year they grew heavier and heavier until they squeezed our lives dry and crowded out everything.  They even crowded out our son and--spoiled him.  They made you into a stone man; they came between me and the people and the things I loved; they walled me off from the world.  My life is empty—­empty.  I want to mother something.”

Hannibal inquired, hoarsely:  “Not this baby, surely?  Not that woman’s child?”