“No, no, oh no! He is not _my_ father; is he, Hugh? Tell me no. John, Dr. Richards, pray look at me and say it’s all a dream, a dreadful dream! Oh, Hugh!” and to the brother, scorned so often, poor ’Lina turned for sympathy, while the stranger continued, “It would be useless for me to say now that I loved the girl, for I did not; but I felt sorry for her, and when six months after my marriage I heard that I was a father I feigned an excuse and left my wife for a few weeks. Eliza, you remember I said I had business in New York, and so I had. I went to this young girl, finding her in a low, wretched garret, with her baby in her arms, and a look on her face which told me she had not long to live. I staid by her till she died, promising to care for her child and mine. I had a mother then, a woman, old and infirm, and good, even if I was her son. To her I went in my trouble, asking that she would care for the helpless thing to which I gave the name Matilda. Mother did not refuse, and leaving the baby in her charge I came back to my lawful wife. “In course of time there was a daughter born to me and to Eliza; a sweet brown-haired, brown-eyed girl, whom we named _Adaline_.” Instinctively, every one in that room glanced at the black eyes and hair of ’Lina, marvelling at the change. “I loved this little girl, as it was natural I should, more than I loved the other, and after she was born I tried to be a better man, but could not hold out long, and at last there came a separation. Eliza would not live with me and I went away, but pined so for my child, that I contrived to steal her, and carried her to my mother, where was the other one.” ’Lina’s eyes were dark as midnight, while she listened breathlessly to this mysterious page of her existence. “My mother was very old and she died suddenly, leaving me alone with my two girls. I could not attend to them both, and so I sent one to Eliza, and kept the other myself, hiring a housekeeper, and because it suited my fancy, passing as Mr. Redfield, guardian to the little child, whom I loved so much.” “That was _Adah_,” fell in a whisper from the doctor’s lips, but caught the ear of no one. All were too intent upon the story, which proceeded; “She grew in beauty, and I was wondrous proud of her, giving her every advantage in my power. I sent her to the best of schools, and even looked forward to the day when she should take the position she was so well fitted to fill. After she was grown to girlhood we boarded, she as the ward, I as the guardian still, and then one unlucky day I stumbled upon _you, Dr. John_, but not until you first had stumbled on my daughter, and been charmed with her beauty, passing yourself as—as George Hastings,— lest your fashionable associates should know how the aristocratic Dr. Richards was in love with a poor, unknown orphan, boarding up two flights of stairs.”