hat would she do with Darrell Court if he left
it to her? The great wish of his heart for a son to succeed him had not
been granted to him; but he had made his will, and in it he had left
Darrell Court to his wife.

He looked at the home he had loved so well. Ah, cruel death! If he could
but have taken it with him, or have watched over it from another world!
But when death came he must leave it, and a dull, uneasy foreboding came
over him as to what he should do in favor of this idolized home.

As he looked at it, tears rose to his eyes; and then he saw Pauline
standing a little way from him, the proud, beautiful face softened into
tenderness, the dark eyes full of kindness. She went up to him more
affectionately than she had ever done in her life; she knelt on the
grass by his side.

"Uncle," she said, quietly, "you look very ill; are you in trouble?"

He held out his hands to her; at the sound of her voice all his heart
seemed to go out to this glorious daughter of his race.

"Pauline," he said, in a low, broken voice, "I am thinking about you--I
am wondering about you. Have I done--I wonder, have I done wrong?"

A clear light flashed into her noble face.

"Do you refer to Darrell Court?" she asked. "If you do, you have done
wrong. I think you might have trusted me. I have many faults, but I am a
true Darrell. I would have done full justice to the trust."

"I never thought so," he returned, feebly; "and I did it all for the
best, as I imagined, Pauline."

"I know you did--I am sure you did," she agreed, eagerly; "I never
thought otherwise. It was not you, uncle. I understand all that was
brought to bear upon you. You are a Darrell, honorable, loyal, true; you
do not understand anything that is not straightforward. I do, because my
life has been so different from yours."

He was looking at her with a strange, wavering expression in his face;
the girl's eyes, full of sympathy, were turned on him.

"Pauline," he said, feebly, "if I have done wrong--and, oh, I am so loth
to believe it--you will forgive me, my dear, will you not?"

For the first time he held out his arms to her; for the first time she
went close to him and kissed his face. It was well that Lady Hampton was
not there to see. Pauline heard him murmur something about "a true
Darrell--the last of the Darrells," and when she raised her head she
found that Sir Oswald had fallen into a deep, deadly swoon.

CHAPTER XXVIII.

READING OF THE WIL