ldren. The day came at last when little
Richard was summoned to her room to kiss a pale woman with great, dark
eyes, at whom he gazed solemnly, wonderingly, but with a profound
conviction that his own mamma had gone away and left her place to be
filled up by somebody else. In point of fact, Mrs. Luttrell's expression
was curiously changed; and the boy's instinct discovered the change at
once. There was a restless, wandering look in her large, dark eyes which
had never been visible in them before her illness, except in moments of
strong excitement. She did not look like herself.

"I want the baby," she said, when she had kissed little Richard and
talked to him for a few moments. "Where is my baby?"

Mr. Luttrell came up to her side and answered her.

"The baby is coming, Margaret; Vincenza is bringing him." Then, after a
pause--"Baby has been ill," he said. "You must be prepared to see a
great change in him."

She looked at him as if she did not understand.

"What change shall I see?" she said. "Tell Vincenza to make haste,
Edward. I must see my baby at once; the doctor said I might see him
to-day."

"Don't excite yourself, Margaret; I'll fetch them," said Mr. Luttrell,
easily. "Come along, Dick; let us find Vincenza and little brother
Brian."

He quitted the room, with Dick at his heels. Mrs. Luttrell was left
alone. But she had not long to wait. Vincenza entered, made a low
reverence, uttered two or three sentences of congratulation on the
English signora's recovery, and then placed the baby on Mrs. Luttrell's
lap.

What happened next nobody ever precisely knew. But in another moment
Vincenza fled from the room, with her hands to her ears, and her face as
white as death.

"The signora is mad--mad!" she gasped, as she met Mr. Luttrell in the
corridor. "She does not know her own child! She says that she will kill
it! I dare not go to her; she says that her baby is dead, and that that
one is mine! Mine! mine! Oh, Holy Virgin in Heaven! she says that the
child is mine!"

Wherewith Vincenza went into strong hysterics, and Mr. Luttrell strode
hastily towards his wife's room, from which the cries of a child could
be heard. He found Mrs. Luttrell sitting with the baby on her knee, but
although the poor little thing was screaming with all its might, she
vouchsafed it no attention.

"Tell Vincenza to take her wretched child away," she said. "I want my
own. This is her child; not mine."

Edward Luttrell stood agh