open window, and think of the great wrong which has been done me. "Oh!" I sob, "how could you, father; how could you sell me so coldly, and without one thought for my happiness. Was I so little to you, did you never think of me as mother's child, even if you could not love me for myself?" Then comes the saving thought that some day, soon, I shall have a little one to love me for myself, with all a baby's idolizing love, so I must do as I should wish that little one to do in my place, so that my child may respect as well as love me; so the hard, cold, unrelenting feeling leaves me, and I kneel and thank God that He has enabled me to return good for evil-that He has given me the power to forgive, even as I would be forgiven. So I go quickly, for fear temptation should again assail me, and tell my mother-inlaw that I forgive her freely, and as I tell her my message of peace, I see a change come over the worn features, and the old discontented look is replaced by one of happiness and rest. 'I am saved, Mable, and by you, whom I have so wronged. God bless you, my child send Richard to me before my strength fails.'

66

I run and send Richard to her, and they are alone-the mother who has known and served no other god but Mammon-the son who is knowing and serving no other god also. god also. Will her pitiful example save him, or will her sins be visited upon her son, and he still persist in the stubborness of unbelief. I hear my name called, and again enter the chamber of death, for the end has come; time is vanquished, and death reigns supreme.

"Be patient with him, Mable," she mutters, "I am going;" and a light shines over the now peaceful face. She has gone; this world and its load of sorrow she has left at the golden gate.

CHAPTER XIV.

Seated in a small but beautifully furnished drawing-room, is Gladys Thornhill, herself the loveliest object in the apartment, which contains so many specimens of exquisite workmanship and beauty.

Her father, a colonel, had seen active service during the Indian mutiny, and had therefore, plenty of opportunities for collecting many valuable and interesting things. He had been dead now for several years, and this, his only child, was comparatively relationless, her mother having died of fever shortly after her little child had been sent home to England with her faithful nurse, who had been a servant in the family for many years, and who had accompanied her young mistress to India on her marriage with Captain Thornhill. Gladys had been well educated under her guardian's care until the age of twenty-one, when she came and settled in the little cottage left her by her father.

I

She is very lovely if we look at her now, and yet there is something repellent, and one might almost say tiger-like in the expression of the fierce brown eyes, which flash like steel when her temper is roused. The corners of the mouth, too, droop unpleasantly, and the thin lines of the eyebrows meet ominously above the perfectly formed grecian nose. So, although the face is one that would well become Shakespeare's shrew, the expression being so cold and haughty, yet the features in themselves are so perfect that one cannot help feeling fascinated by its loveliness.

Gladys is one of those who boasts that she has always had her way, and certainly she rules her small household with a rod of iron. The trim housemaid almost shrinks from her mistress when she passes her on the small staircase, and the miniature page boy trembles before her as she gives some sharp reprimand for some forgotten order.

There is only one that really loves this cold and haughty woman and that is old Susan Hopkinson her nurse, she it is that softens the wayward beauty when her uncontrolled temper

frightens even herself. The door opens and she enters, "If you please Miss Gladys a man has come about the gardener's place, and I do believe although he has grown a beard, as its Lord Elston's old valet, but how he can know about gardening is more than I can tell." "Never mind what you may think, Susan, I am quite capable of judging for myself, ask the man to step in and speak with me here." The door again opens and true to old Susan's word the man who enters is Lord Elston's old valet, Jacob Richards, who had been discharged at Montè Carlo, but he is so well disguised that none but those who were quick and suspicious, could possibly have recognised him. "What is your name?" Gladys demands, "Jack Morris if you please miss." "You are telling me a lie, man,' exclaimed Gladys fiercely, "Your name is Jacob Richards and you are Lord Elston's valet.'

66

"What are you here for may I ask? answer me truthfully or I will tell his Lordship all about you."

The man shakes from head to foot beneath the piercing brown eyes.