"What is the matter with you, George? How queerly you speak! You knew we should be awfully poor when father died. You are going to pay for your board, are you not, when you come to us, and that will be a great help." "Yes, of course; I vow and declare that I'll give mother at least half of what I earn." "Well, that will be fifty pounds--a great help. My idea for myself is--but----" Effie stopped abruptly. She saw that George was making an impatient movement. "I'll tell you another time," she said in a gentle voice. "You have something now to tell me, have you not?" "I have--God knows I have. I want to get two hundred and fifty pounds somewhere." "Two hundred and fifty pounds!" exclaimed Effie. George might just as well have asked her for the moon. "I don't understand," she said, after a pause. "No, and I never want you to, Effie," replied the young man. "I can't tell you what I want the money for, but it's a matter of life and death. I thought I had made up my mind"--a husky sound came into his throat--"I made up my mind to tell everything to my father when I came down that night--I could have told him. It was not a sort of thing to talk to you about, but I thought I could tell him; he died, and he gave me mother. He left mother with me. You know perfectly well, Effie, that our mother's life hangs on a thread. You know she must not have a shock, and yet--Effie, Effie, if I don't get that L250, she will have such a shock, such a terrible shock, that it will send her to her grave!" "I must think," said Effie. "I cannot answer you in a moment." "Is there no earthly way you can help me? I must be helped," said George in a frantic voice. "I have got six weeks longer--I must get that L250 in six weeks, or--no, I can't tell you." "Yes, you must try--I won't help you unless you try." "Well, then--here goes. If I don't get it, I shall have to go to--_prison_." George's voice sank to a hoarse whisper. Effie could not suppress a cry. CHAPTER XI. "Then you have done something wrong," said Effie, loosening her hold of her brother's arm and backing to a little distance. He could scarcely see her face in the ever increasing darkness, but he noticed the change in her voice. There was an indignant note of pained and astonished youth in it. Effie had never come face to face with the graver sins of life; the word "prison" stunned her, she forgot pity for a moment in indignation. "George," she said, with a sort of gasp, "father left mother to you,--in a sort of way he gave her up to you,--and you have done wrong; you have sinned."