"And that I will with pleasure, Sir Karl, if you will furnish me with an address to write to." "And be sure, Hewitt, that you send to me in any trouble or sickness. I wish my poor mother's life was a less lonely one!" Hewitt shook his head as he left the room. He felt sure that his mistress would never more allow her life to be anything but a lonely one: the light of it had gone out of it for ever with her beloved son. Sir Karl went up to his chamber shortly. Before he had well closed his door, a maid knocked at it, and said Mrs. Andinnian wished to see him. Karl had supposed his mother to be in bed: instead of that, he found her standing by the fire in her little sitting-room, and not undressed. "Shut the door, Karl," she said--and he saw that her face was working with some painful emotion. "I have been debating a question with myself the better part of this evening, down stairs and up--whether or no I shall disclose to you the trouble that is upon us: and I have resolved to do so. Of two evils, it may, perhaps, be the least." "I am very glad indeed, my mother." "Hush!" she solemnly said, lifting a warning hand. "Speak not before you know. Glad! It has been consideration for you, Sir Karl," she added, in that stern and distant tone that so pained him, "that has alone kept me silent. You have no doubt been thinking me unnaturally cold and reserved; but my heart has been aching. Aching for you. If I have not loved you with the passionate love I bore for your poor brother--and oh, Karl, he was my firstborn!--I have not been so neglectful of you as you may imagine. In striving to keep you away from Foxwood, I was but anxious that your peace should not be imperilled earlier than it was obliged to be." "Let me hear it mother. I can bear it, I daresay." "You may _bear_ it, Karl. A man can bear most things. But, my son, I dread to tell it you. You will regard it as an awful calamity, a frightful perplexity, and your spirit may faint under it." Karl smiled sadly. "Mother, after the calamities I have undergone within the past year I do not think Fate can have any worse in store for me." "Wait--and judge. Your anger will naturally fall on me, Karl, as the chief author of it. Blame me, my son, to your heart's content: it is my just due. I would soften the story to you if I knew how: but it admits not of softening. What is done cannot be undone." Mrs. Andinnian rose, opened the door, looked up and down the corridor, shut it again, and bolted it. "I do not need to fear eaves-droppers in the house," she observed, "and the doors are thick: but this secret is as a matter of life or death. Sit down there, Karl,"--pointing to a chair opposite her own. "I would rather stand, mother."