The young wife gasped with surprise, and her face whitened suddenly. She sat down abruptly, with her hand upon her heart. “His father?” she murmured. Craven Black bowed, while he regarded her and her surroundings curiously. The dingy, poverty-stricken little room, with its meagre plenishing and no luxuries, struck him as being but one remove from an alms-house. The young wife, in her wretchedly poor attire, with her big black eyes and brown face, from which all color had been stricken by his announcement, seemed to him a very commonplace young person, quite of the lower orders, and he wondered that his university bred son could have loved her, and that he still desired to cling to her and his poverty, rather than to leave her and wed an heiress. For a moment or more Lally remained motionless and stupefied, and then the color flashed back to her cheeks and lips, and the brightness to her eyes. She could interpret the visit of Craven Black in but one manner--as a token of his reconciliation with his son. “Ah, sir, I beg your pardon,” she said, arising to her feet, “but I was sorely frightened. I have been so anxious about Rufus. I expected him home last night. And I could not dream that you would come to our poor home.” She placed a chair for him, but he continued standing, hat in hand, and leaned carelessly upon the chair back. He was the picture of elegance and cool serenity, while Lally, flushed and excited, glanced down at her own attire in dismay. “I understand that Rufus has remained in Kent,” she said, all breathless and joyous, “and I suppose you have been kind enough to come to take me to him. I fear I am hardly fit to accompany you, Mr. Black. We have been so poor, so terribly poor. But I will be ready in a moment. Oh, I am so grateful to you, sir, for your goodness to us. Poor Rufus feared your anger more than all things else. I know I am no fit match for your son, but--but I love him so,” and the bright face drooped shyly. “I will be a good wife to him, sir, and a good daughter to you.” “Stay,” said Mr. Black, in a cold, metallic voice. “You are laboring under a misapprehension, Miss Bird. I am not come to take you down into Kent. You will never look upon the face of Rufus Black again.” “_Sir!_” “I mean it, madam. I pity you from my soul; I do, indeed. It were better for you if you had never seen Rufus Black. You fancy yourself his wife. You are not so.” “Not his wife? Oh, sir, then you do not know? Why, we were married at St. Mary’s Church, in the parish of Newington. Our marriage is registered there, and Rufus has a certificate of the marriage.”