“Have you no compassion?” I cried.  But Mrs. Temple interrupted me.

“He has the right,” she faltered; “it is my just punishment.”

He tore himself away, and took a step to her.

“Where is Riddle?” he cried.  “As God lives, I will kill him without mercy!”

His mother lifted her head again.

“God has judged him,” she said quietly; “he is beyond your vengeance—­he is dead.”  A sob shook her, but she conquered it with a marvellous courage.  “Harry Riddle loved me, he was kind to me, and he was a better man than John Temple.”

Nick recoiled.  The fierceness of his anger seemed to go, leaving a more dangerous humor.

“Then I have been blessed with parents,” he said.

At that she swayed, but when I would have caught her she motioned me away and turned to Antoinette.  Twice Mrs. Temple tried to speak.

“I was going away to-night,” she said at length, “and you would never have seen or heard of me more.  My nephew David—­Mr. Ritchie—­whom I treated cruelly as a boy, had pity on me.  He is a good man, and he was to have taken me away—­I do not attempt to defend myself, my dear, but I pray that you, who have so much charity, will some day think a little kindly of one who has sinned deeply, of one who will love and bless you and yours to her dying day.”

She faltered, and Nick would have spoken had not Antoinette herself stayed him with a gesture.

“I wish—­my son to know the little there is on my side.  It is not much.  Yet God may not spare him the sorrow that brings pity.  I—­I loved Harry Riddle as a girl.  My father was ruined, and I was forced into marriage with John Temple for his possessions.  He was selfish, overbearing, cruel—­unfaithful.  During the years I lived with him he never once spoke kindly to me.  I, too, grew wicked and selfish and heedless.  My head was turned by admiration.  Mr. Temple escaped to England in a man-of-war; he left me without a line of warning, of farewell.  I—­I have wandered over the earth, haunted by remorse, and I knew no moment of peace, of happiness, until you brought me here and sheltered and loved me.  And even here I have had many sleepless hours.  A hundred times I have summoned my courage to tell you,—­I could not.  I am justly punished, Antoinette.”  She moved a little, timidly, towards the girl, who stood motionless, dazed by what she heard.  She held out a hand, appealingly, and dropped it.  “Good-by, my dear; God will bless you for your kindness to an unfortunate outcast.”

She glanced with a kind of terror in her eyes from the girl to Nick, and what she meant to say concerning their love I know not, for the flood, held back so long, burst upon her.  She wept as I have never seen a woman weep.  And then, before Nick or I knew what had happened, Antoinette had taken her swiftly in her arms and was murmuring in her ear:—­

“You shall not go.  You shall not.  You will live with me always.”