The old lady tried to speak but her voice failed her. "More than that," continued the Consul-General, "as he deliberately took sides against us, I also think it is our duty—our strict and bounden duty—to dismiss all further thought of him." Saying this with heat and emphasis, he caught sight of his wife’s wet eyes and his conscience began to accuse him. "I don’t say it is easy to do," he said, taking a chair by the side of the bed. "Perhaps it is the reverse of easy—especially for you—for his mother." At that the sweet old woman wished to take the part of her absent son—to say that if he had taken the wrong course, and allowed himself to be led away by some one, he could not have counted on any gain in doing so, and must have been moved by the most unselfish motives—but her tears prevented her, and still she could not speak. "Why should we continue to think of _him_ if he never thinks of _us_—of either of us?" asked the Consul-General. He was calmer now, and was speaking with less anger. "Was he thinking of you when he took the step which broke up your health like this? Was he thinking of me when he took the side of my enemies—of one of my enemies, at all events—perhaps the worst of them—and left me to the mercy of ... in my old age, too—a childless man?" There was a moment in which nothing was spoken, and then in a voice that quivered perceptibly the Consul-General said— "Let us trifle with ourselves no longer, Janet. Our son has gone. He has abandoned us. We have to think no more about him." After that there was a long silence, during which the Consul-General sat with his head down and his eyes tightly closed. Then a voice came softly from the bed. "John!" "Well?" "It is harder for you, dear." The old man turned his head aside. "You wanted a son so much, you know." Fatimah, who had been sitting out of sight, now stepped into the boys’ room and closed the door noiselessly behind her, leaving the two old people alone together with the sanctities of their married life, on which no other eye should look. "I thought at first that God was not going to give me any children, but when my child came, and it was a boy, how happy we both were!" The old man closed his eyes still more tightly and stiffened his iron lip. "Foolish people used to think in those days that you didn’t love our little one because you couldn’t pay much heed to him. But Fatimah was telling me only to-night that you never went to bed without going into her room to see if it was well with our child." The tears were now forcing themselves through the old man’s eyelids. "And when our dear boy had the fever, and he was so ill that we had to shave his little head, you never went to bed at all—not until the crisis came, and then—don’t you remember?—just when we thought the wings of death were over us, he opened his beautiful blue eyes and smiled. I think that was the happiest moment of all our lives, dear."