When she realized that she owed her very life to the girl who had watched over her so ceaselessly and that that girl was Jessie Bain, her emotion was great. She buried her poor face in her hands, and they heard her murmur brokenly: "God is surely heaping coals of fire upon my head." On the very day that she was able to leave her couch for the first time, and to lean on that strong brave young arm that helped her into the sunny drawing-room, Jessie herself was stricken down. In those days that had dragged their slow flight by, Mrs. Varrick had experienced a great change of heart. She had learned to love Jessie a thousand times more than she ever hated her. And now when this calamity came upon the girl, her grief knew no bounds. What if the girl should die, and Hubert should still believe her guilty of the theft of the diamonds. God would never forgive her for her sin. There was but one way to atone for it, and that was to make a full confession. It was the hardest task of her life when her son, whom she had sent for, stood before her. When she attempted to utter the words, to lead to the subject uppermost in her mind, her heart grew faint, her lips faltered. "Come and sit beside me, Hubert; I have something to tell you," she said. He did as she requested, attempting to take her thin, white hands down from her poor disfigured face. "Promise, beforehand, that you will not hate me." "I could not hate you, mother," he said, gently. Burying her face still deeper in the folds of her handkerchief, while her form swayed to and fro, she told him all in broken words. At length she had finished, and a silence like death fell between them. Raising her head slowly from the folds of her handkerchief, she cast her eyes fearfully in his direction. To her intense amazement, she saw him leaning back comfortably in his seat. "Hubert!" she gasped, "are you not bitterly angry with me? Speak!" "I was very angry, I confess, mother, when this was first known to me; but I have had time since to think the matter over calmly. You acted under the pressure of intense excitement, I concluded, and pride, which was always your besetting sin, mother; and that gained the ascendency over you to the extent that you would rather have seen Jessie in a prison cell, though she was innocent, than see her my wife!" "You knew it before I told you?" she exclaimed. "But how did you find out?" "That must be _my_ secret, for the time being, mother," he returned. "Be thankful that no harm came from your nefarious scheme. If Jessie had been thrown into a prison cell and persecuted unjustly, I admit that I should never have forgiven you while life lasted. Now, every thought is swallowed up in the fear that her illness may terminate as yours did, mother. But this I say to you: if she were the most-scarred creature on the face of the earth, I should still love her and wish to marry her." "I should not oppose it, my son," said his mother.