"That villain--whom I cannot curse now because he was hung this morning--confessed all to me last night. My darling! you were cruelly wronged, and I was mad and blind to believe all the lies he told me at first." "The best he could tell you was bad enough," she said, remorsefully. "It was wicked, it was terrible of me to have encouraged that clandestine acquaintance and secret love, deserting my home and loved ones for a stranger of whom I knew nothing, except that he was handsome, and that his romantic wooing took my foolish heart by storm. "Oh, the bitter consequences that have followed that act of girlish folly! "My own deep disgrace, my father's death from a broken heart, poor Sydney's dreadful murder, mamma and Georgina's everlasting alienation from me?" She clasped her hands, and tears stood bright as dew-drops in her soft, blue eyes. "Yes, darling," he said, as he laid his little son back in her arms, "your youthful folly has, indeed, worked out a terrible retribution. If your tragic story could be written it might teach many parents to guard their daughters more carefully, and many a thoughtless girl might grow wiser and profit by your dreadful experience. The fitting text for such a mournful story might be, 'Girls never keep a secret from your parents!'" "Am I _de trop_?" asked Uncle Robert, putting his gray head and smiling face into the room at that moment. "Never, Uncle Robert. You are one of us now, and always," said Captain Ernscliffe, bringing him in and giving him a cordial pressure of the hand. Queenie looked up with the bright tears still shining in her eyes. He kissed her fondly, then bent over the little babe to hide the dew of tenderness that dimmed his kindly blue orbs. "I shall have to give up my little pet now," he said, a little sadly. "No, you shall not, Uncle Robbie. You are to come home with us, and live with us always. You shall not live alone any longer," said Queenie, tenderly and gratefully. * * * * * Three years later, when Robbie was the loveliest and most mischievous little, dark-eyed lad that ever delighted a parent's heart, they all went abroad again. Captain Ernscliffe, who was the fondest and most devoted husband in the world, had taken an absurd fancy that Queenie's roses were fading and that a European tour would improve her health. So one bright, sunny morning in the month of roses, they found themselves registered as boarders at a famous health resort in Germany. But after Captain Ernscliffe had smoked his cigar on the balcony, he came into his wife's airy room with a frown on his dark, handsome face. "I shall have to take you away to-morrow, my dear," he said. "I have found out that your mother and sister are staying here. Of course it would be embarrassing to all parties if we remained." "Yes, we must go away," she said, but she sighed as she spoke. It had been a bitter cross to her that her mother and sister would not recognize her.