There was a knock at the door, and Jim appeared, inquiring if the doctor would have the carriage brought around. It was nearly time to go, and with the whispered words to Anna, "I have told you what no one else must ever know," the doctor descended with his sister to the parlor, where his mother was waiting for him. The opening and shutting of the door caused a draught of air, which, falling on the fainting Adah, restored her to consciousness, and struggling to her feet, she tried to think what it was that had happened. "Oh, George! George!" she gasped. "You are worse than I believed. You have made me an outcast, and Willie--" George was a greater villain than she had imagined a man could be, and again her white lips essayed to curse him, but the rash act was stayed by the low words whispered in her ear, "Forgive as we would be forgiven." "If it were not for Willie, I might, but, oh! my boy, my boy disgraced," was the rebellious spirit's answer, when again the voice whispered, "And who art thou to contend against thy God? Know you not that I am the Father of the fatherless?" There were tears now in Adah's eyes, the first which she had shed. "I'll try," she murmured, "try to forgive the wrong, but the strength must all be Thine," and then, though there came no sound or motion, her heart went out in agonizing prayer, that she might forgive even as she hoped to be forgiven. "God tell me what to do with Willie?" she sobbed, starting suddenly as the answer to her prayer seemed to come at once. "Oh, can I do that?" she moaned; "can I leave him here?" At first her whole soul recoiled from it, but when she remembered Anna, and how much she loved the child, her feelings began to change. Anna would love him more when she knew he was poor Lily's and her own brother's. She would be kind to him for his father's sake, and for the sake of the girl she had professed to like. Mrs. Richards, too, would not cast him off. She thought too much of the Richards' blood, and there was surely enough in Willie's veins to wipe out all taint of hers. Willie should be bequeathed to Anna. It would break her heart to leave him, were it not already broken, but it was better so. It would be better in the end. He would forget her in time, forget the girlish woman he had called mamma, unless sweet Anna told him of her, as perhaps she might. Dear Anna, how Adah longed to fold her arms about her once and call her sister, but she must not. It might not be well received, for Anna had some pride, as her waiting maid had learned. "A waiting maid!" Adah repeated the name, smiling bitterly as she thought. "A waiting maid in his own home! Who would have dreamed that I should ever come to this, when he painted the future so grandly?" Then there came over her the wild, yearning desire to see his face once more, to know if he had changed, and why couldn't she? They supposed her gone to the office, and she would go there now, taking the depot on the way.