Chapter 27 - Page 2

their lips clung together as in the kiss given to the dying.

"Leonard!" said she at length, holding him away from her, and nerving herself up to tell him all by one spasmodic effort--"listen to me." The boy stood breathless and still, gazing at her. On her impetuous transit from Mr. Bradshaw's to the Chapel-house her wild, desperate thought had been that she would call herself by every violent, coarse name which the world might give her--that Leonard should hear those words applied to his mother first from her own lips; but the influence of his presence--for he was a holy and sacred creature in her eyes, and this point remained steadfast, though all the rest were upheaved--subdued her; and now it seemed as if she could not find words fine enough, and pure enough, to convey the truth that he must learn, and should learn from no tongue but hers.

"Leonard! when I was very young I did very wrong. I think God, who knows all, will judge me more tenderly than men--but I did wrong in a way which you cannot understand yet" (she saw the red flush come into his cheek, and it stung her as the first token of that shame which was to be his portion through life)--"in a way people never forget, never forgive. You will hear me called the hardest names that ever can be thrown at women--I have been to-day; and, my child, you must bear it patiently, because they will be partly true. Never get confused, by your love for me, into thinking that what I did was right.--Where was I?" said she, suddenly faltering, and forgetting all she had said and all she had got to say; and then, seeing Leonard's face of wonder, and burning shame and indignation, she went on more rapidly, as fearing lest her strength should fail before she had ended.

"And, Leonard," continued she, in a trembling, sad voice, "this is not all. The punishment of punishments lies awaiting me still. It is to see you suffer from my wrongdoing. Yes, darling! they will speak shameful things of you, poor innocent child! as well as of me, who am guilty. They will throw it in your teeth through life, that your mother was never married--was not married when you were born----"

"Were not you married? Are not you a widow?" asked he abruptly, for the first time getting anything like a clear idea of the real state of the case.

"No! May God forgive me, and help me!" exclaimed she, as she saw a strange look of repugnance cloud over the boy's face, and felt a slight motion on his part to extricate himself from her hold. It was as slight, as transient as it could be--over in an instant. But she had taken her hands away, and covered up her face with them as quickly--covered up her face in shame before her child; and in the bitterness of her heart she was wailing out, "Oh! would to God I had died--that I had died as a baby--that I had died as a little baby hanging at my mother's