"When you parted with your boy, you gave him, without knowing what you were doing, statesmen and captains, great lords and barons that belong to history, even kings and queens, for ancestors. Now, without warning--how could one warn a young man of such a thing?--you suddenly rob him of all these possessions. You give him for a father, a worthless scoundrel, to use plain language--a man whose record is horrible and shameful, a deceiver and deserter of women, a low-class buffoon, a fellow who met with the end which he deserved in a workhouse, after a final exhibition of himself as a sandwich-man at one and twopence a day. The mere thought of such a father is enough to reduce this unfortunate young man to madness. And for other relations, I repeat, you offer him, in place of his present cousins, who are gentlefolk of ancient birth, with all that belongs to that possession, such humble--perhaps such unworthy--people as Dick sums up under such titles as 'the pew-opener,' 'the small draper,' and 'the mendicant bankrupt.' Can you imagine Humphrey, with his pride of birth, calling upon the Hackney draper, and taking tea with the pew-opener?" "They are my cousins, too, Sir Robert," said Molly. "And I get along without much trouble about them." "Yours? Very likely. Why not?" he replied impatiently. "You are used to them. You were born to them. Sir Humphrey was not." He turned again to Alice. "Have you considered these things? You must consider them--in pity to your son--in pity to yourself." Alice made no reply. "Your son will be crushed, beaten down, humiliated to the lowest, by this revelation. Ask yourself how he will reward the people who have caused the discovery. Will he reward the hand which inflicts this lifelong shame--it can be nothing less to him--with affection and gratitude--or----? Finish the question for yourself." Alice clasped her hands. Then she rose and bowed her head. "Lord, have mercy upon me, miserable sinner!" she murmured. Molly laid her arm round her waist. "Take me to my room," she murmured. Her room opened out of the sitting-room. Through the open door Sir Robert saw her lying rather than kneeling at the bedside, her arms thrown upon the counterpane. Molly stood over her, the tears streaming down her cheeks. The doctor beckoned the girl to leave her. "My dear"--his own eyes were dim with an unaccustomed blurr; he could walk without emotion through a hundred wards filled with suffering bodies, but he had never walked the ward of suffering souls--"my dear, leave her for a while. We are all miserable sinners, you and Dick, with your revengeful thoughts, and I, and everybody. And the greatest sinner is the young man himself." "I did not think," Molly sobbed. "I only thought--we only wanted to prove the case." "It is the old, old parable. The false mother thinks only of herself; the true mother thinks of her son. Solomon, I thank thee!"