On hearing these words, which for the first time in her life brought the real state of things home to her, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that young Mrs. Haggard's heart died within her. Was it not her duty to her child, to her husband, and to herself, to instantly make a clean breast of the whole mystery? Perhaps it was, but she struggled fiercely against the natural impulse to adopt this simple course. The fact has been insisted upon that secrecy was foreign to Georgie Haggard's nature; she hated deception and the very idea of anything which was underhand. Had she given way to her natural impulse, and then and there told her husband the truth, the dark web of intrigue which surrounded her innocent life would have been torn aside and dispersed at once and for ever. But with Georgie, unhappily for herself, her promise bound her as tightly as the most terrible oath. She had promised never to reveal Lucy's secret, and come what might, should this moral Juggernaut crush her, her child, and her offspring yet unborn, yet she would be true to it; her word, once plighted, should be kept to the bitter end. "I think it's cruel, Reginald," she said, and the tears were in her eyes, "cruel and wicked too. What has he done, poor little fellow, that he should be made to inherit a sort of curse?" But before her husband could answer this very natural objection, the door was flung violently open and the child Lucius, his face suffused with angry colour, bounced into the room. To his breast he clutched a tiny white kitten, it was quite young, its eyes not being yet open. "Dad," he cried in a tone of rage, "Auntie says I shan't see the tittens drowned. I do want so much to see them drowned. I hate Auntie Lucy, and I hate Fanchette." Fanchette now appeared upon the scene, indignant and out of breath. The child, tossing the kitten from him, sprung upon Haggard's lap, and again expressed his intense desire to be present at the execution of the kittens. "Dad," he said in a tone of affectionate entreaty, "I never seed a titten drowned." Perhaps it was natural after all. Just in the same way as an adult goes to an execution, because he "never has seen one, you know"--he forgets that it is "a thing to shudder at not to see"--so the little Lucius was anxious to assist at the immolation of the kittens. "No, my man, you mustn't be cruel," and then Haggard attempted to argue with the child. But the little fellow pleaded, looking up into Haggard's face with his big brown eyes. "Me tiss oo, dad," he said, and he did so vehemently. Haggard stroked the child's long golden curls, and placed him gently on the floor. "Can't be done, my man," he said. At once the child's face changed and became frightful to behold; the corners of his mouth went down, the whites of his eyes became injected, the tears coursed freely down his cheeks, he clenched his little fists and screamed aloud in his rage and fury.