"Christopher," she said, with an effort, "I made a promise years ago that when this hour came I would tell you the truth about yourself. Our name is not Routh, but Maxwell; you are the son of the Captain Maxwell who saved you--and brought you back to me. You remember him as the 'Captain Geraldine' who lodged with us in London? He had married me six years before, when we were but little more than boy and girl, and when you were born he was wandering a shipwrecked man in Russia, seeking eagerly some means of return to us, though I was persuaded he had deserted me. When he returned, and was willing to acknowledge me as his wife, I was hardened into a heartless woman, believing myself separated, by what I ignorantly called God's grace, from him and the world to which he belonged. In my pride I refused to let him come into our lives, though he implored me to let him make such restitution as was in his power. He behaved as few men would have done; for the sake of the old love, he bore with me and accepted my conditions--that he would never mention our marriage, and would never come between you and me. He let you go away from his side in Louisbourg, though his heart was yearning for you; because his honour, a quality which I pretended not to understand, forbade him to forget his promise to me. He was always good to me, far beyond my deserts, and my hope, now that my eyes are opened, is that you, Christopher, will remember my debt to him. "Try and be gentle, my boy. Be true to him. He has had a sad, lonely life, but you may make it up to him yet. When you see him, tell him from me... tell Hugh..."--but here I silently withdrew, leaving the mother to whisper her last message of contrition to the boy kneeling beside her bed. Pitiful as was poor Lucy's story, I could gather but little comfort from it. It seemed to me that in marrying out of his own class Hugh had committed so grave a fault that whatever followed in the way of misunderstanding was but to be expected. He had been kind, forbearing, larger-minded than she had known; she had not even realised the sense of honour which had made her a wife and not a mistress. It had gone the way of all mistakes, and produced nothing but bitterness and regret. From it I could gather no excuse, no justification of his conduct towards me; he had allowed my affection to grow up and centre in him without a warning I could understand of the heart-break which confronted me, and I could not see that his obligation towards her who had cast his love aside was more sacred than to her to whom it was all in all. We laid Lucy to rest in the garden of the Hospital--without the rites of the Church, it is true, but not without both prayers and tears, and then took up the daily round of duty once more.