hilippe back to me."

Cecile said nothing, but very gently, very tenderly guided the blind
mother's steps as they wended their way homeward in the sweet summer
twilight.

Half an hour later Cecile paced restlessly up and down the broad veranda
of her home. She had left her mother sleeping on the couch in her pretty
sitting-room upstairs and could now face the problems and difficulties
which confronted her. In her mind she reviewed the years that had come
and gone since that sad night when her dying father had whispered almost
with his last breath:

"Your mother, Cecile; I trust her to you. Take care of her for me when I
am no longer here to watch over her myself. Promise me you will shield
her from every worry, that you will stand between her and all troubles
as I have always done."

The girl had promised and right faithfully had she kept her word, but at
what a cost to herself! She was thinking now of her promise and of how
she had kept it. She was thinking, too, of her mother's serious illness
which had followed that night, an illness from which she had recovered,
it is true, but which left her blind for life. What a terrible calamity
her mother's blindness had appeared to be at that time, and yet, there
came a day, that dreadful day two years ago, when she had thanked God on
her knees for the affliction which enabled her to conceal the trouble
which had come upon them.

Once more she lived through that day two years ago, the day when those
awful letters had come, one from Philippe, one from the lawyers. She had
read them at first without comprehending their meaning. Then as the
truth began to dawn upon her, she cried to herself that it could not be
true, it could not be. There was some terrible mistake somewhere. But
there it was before her in black and white; Philippe's own confession,
the lawyers' letter confirming all the facts. They were ruined,
penniless, and Philippe had done this thing; Philippe, her tall handsome
brother, the pride and darling of their mother's heart. But worse than
poverty, worse than ruin faced them. Philippe was a disgraced man,
sentenced to jail for fifteen years.

It was an old, old story; she had heard of such cases before but paid
little heed to them. Now it was Philippe, her brother, and oh! how
different it all seemed. It was simply the story of an ambitious young
man, making his way in the world, winning name and fame among the ablest
financiers of the Western city in which h