What a drive home that was! Paris, anywhere seemed home now! I had John and my uncles; John had me and my uncle; my uncles had each other; and I suspect, if we could have looked into Martha, we should have seen that she, through her lovely unselfishness, possessed us all more than any one of us another. Oh the outbursts of gladness on the way!--the talks!--the silences! The past fell off like an ugly veil from the true face of things; the present was sunshine; the future a rosy cloud. When we reached our hotel, it was dinner-time, and John ordered champagne. He and I were hungry as two happy children; the brothers ate little, and scarcely drank. They were too full of each other to have room for any animal need. A strange solemnity crowned and dominated their gladness. Each was to the other a Lazarus given back from the grave. But to understand the depth of their rapture, you must know their story. That of Martha and Mary and Lazarus could not have equalled it but for the presence of the Master, for neither sisters nor brother had done each other any wrong. They looked to me like men walking in a luminous mist--a mist of unspeakable suffering radiant with a joy as unspeakable--the very stuff to fashion into glorious dreams. When we drew round the fire, for the evenings were chilly, they laid their whole history open to us. What a tale it was! and what a telling of it! My own uncle, Edward, was the principal narrator, but was occasionally helped out by my newer uncle, Edmund. I had the story already, my reader will remember, in my uncle's writing, at home: when we returned I read it--not with the same absorption as if it had come first, but with as much interest, and certainly with the more thorough comprehension that I had listened to it before. That same written story I shall presently give, supplemented by what, necessarily, my uncle Edmund had to supply, and with some elucidation from the spoken narrative of my uncle Edward. As the story proceeded, overcome with the horror of the revelation I foresaw, I forgot myself, and cried out-- “And that woman is John's mother!” “Whose mother?” asked uncle Edmund, with scornful curiosity. “John Day's,” I answered. “It cannot be!” he cried, blazing up. “Are you sure of it?” “I have always been given so to understand,” replied John for me; “but I am by no means sure of it. I have doubted it a thousand times.” “No wonder! Then we may go on! But, indeed, to believe you her son, would be to doubt you! I _don't_ believe it.” “You could not help doubting me!” responded John. “--I might be true, though, even if I were her son!” he added. “Ed,” said Edmund to Edward, “let us lay our heads together!” “Ready Ed!” said Edward to Edmund. Thereupon they began comparing memories and recollections,--to find, however, that they had by no means data enough. One thing was clear to me--that nothing would be too bad for them to believe of her.