“He took me to the Virginia hotel, and when I had sufficiently recovered to talk he said with decision, ‘I feel you were sent to me this night, raised up from the ashes of my buried hopes, and if you are free to marry I want you for my wife. I care not what your past has been or what caused you to try such a rash act. Your sweet, refined face tells me you are good and for the rest I care naught. I do not profess to love you, neither do I expect you to love me, but we will try to make life endurable together. You saved my life as much as I saved yours, for by saving you I saved my own, for I went there tonight for the very purpose of doing what you tried to do. Come now, what do you say?’ he said earnestly.” “And what did you say?” “I said I was willing to try, and thank God that I did, for I have never regretted it. We were married that night between eleven and twelve.” “And what about Gretta?” “Ned made what reparation he could; that is, he married her, and they have a dear little Ned eight months old.” TALE TWELVE. TWO BABES AND TWO MOTHERS. “They say best men are moulded out of faults; And for the most, become much more the better For being a little bad.” “Yes, we are very happy here.” “That fact is very evident and, as I am out for a story today, I am going to be so rude as to ask you if there is not some pain back of all this peacefulness?” The woman addressed drew herself up to her full height, which was little more than five feet, while her gray eyes gleamed with the assurance of complete possession of some article of value. This woman was not handsome, in fact had she been placed in less effective surroundings she would have been homely. But she was good, although the fact that she had borne cares could not well be concealed. It was her nature and intention to see the brightest side of any object, and that trait in her character was so dominant that it outshone her physical imperfections. The writer had known her a very long time, and she had often promised him a story, so that it took but little urging on his part to get her to talk of her past life. “I was never a famous beauty, an actress, a singer of note, nor a rich man’s daughter,” she said, by way of beginning. “I was a simple country girl whose chief duties consisted in helping my mother wash, iron, churn and pull weeds in the garden in the summer months, while the winter days were whiled away by washing dishes, going to school, and if nothing of greater importance came up for the evening, sewing carpet rags until bed time.