Long they continued to sit there and talk, always upon that one subject, because everything else must be subordinated to the wonderful revelation that had come to them, to prove that truth is often stranger than fiction. Three times did Hugh suggest that he had better be heading towards home: but they pleaded with him to stay "just a little longer"; for their starved hearts found it hard to let the newly found treasure out of sight, even for a short time. "But I must really be going," Hugh finally told them. "It is now after ten, and mother will be worrying about the child, not knowing, of course, that he has found a new protector, two of them, in fact. You can both come over after breakfast in the morning, and visit the boy. If his mother has regained her senses, and the doctor permits it, you will be able to settle the matter once and for all by seeing her." So with that they had to rest content. The child was bundled up warmly, and tenderly placed in the sleigh by his huge grandfather, after the old lady had kissed his forehead and cheeks a dozen times. Then they were off, and shortly afterwards arrived at the Morgan home. Deacon Winslow insisted on carrying the tiny chap indoors; after which he hastened back, to sit up most of the night with his wife, talking of the wonderful thing that had come to bless them in their old age. And Hugh, on his part, had a deeply interested auditor in his mother, as he spun the yarn that equaled anything he had ever read in the Arabian Nights. CHAPTER XVIII IN A SAFE HARBOR AT LAST Hugh had finished breakfast on Sunday morning, and was out looking after a few pets he had in the way of Belgian hares and homing pigeons, when he heard his mother calling him. "Coming, Mother!" he answered hack, thinking on the spur of the moment he was needed to look after the furnace or steam boiler, from which the hired girl did not always succeed in getting the best results on particularly frosty mornings. She waited for him just inside the door. Hugh saw immediately that his first surmise was wrong, for there was a look on her face to tell him it was no trivial matter she had to communicate. "What is it, Mother?" he asked quickly. "She is asking for you, Hugh," he was told. Then he suddenly remembered about the young mother who had lain there since Thursday evening, and out of her mind with fever. "Oh! then the good old Doc was right!" Hugh exclaimed; "he said, you know, that he felt sure she'd be in her right senses by Sunday morning. You've been talking with her, have you, Mother?"