rts beat with affection for him no matter
how cruelly he has pained them."

"He has been his own worst enemy," said Theobald. "He has never loved us
as we deserved, and now he will be withheld by false shame from wishing
to see us. He will avoid us if he can."

"Then we must go to him ourselves," said Christina, "whether he likes it
or not we must be at his side to support him as he enters again upon the
world."

"If we do not want him to give us the slip we must catch him as he leaves
prison."

"We will, we will; our faces shall be the first to gladden his eyes as he
comes out, and our voices the first to exhort him to return to the paths
of virtue."

"I think," said Theobald, "if he sees us in the street he will turn round
and run away from us. He is intensely selfish."

"Then we must get leave to go inside the prison, and see him before he
gets outside."

After a good deal of discussion this was the plan they decided on
adopting, and having so decided, Theobald wrote to the governor of the
gaol asking whether he could be admitted inside the gaol to receive
Ernest when his sentence had expired. He received answer in the
affirmative, and the pair left Battersby the day before Ernest was to
come out of prison.

Ernest had not reckoned on this, and was rather surprised on being told a
few minutes before nine that he was to go into the receiving room before
he left the prison as there were visitors waiting to see him. His heart
fell, for he guessed who they were, but he screwed up his courage and
hastened to the receiving room. There, sure enough, standing at the end
of the table nearest the door were the two people whom he regarded as the
most dangerous enemies he had in all the world--his father and mother.

He could not fly, but he knew that if he wavered he was lost.

His mother was crying, but she sprang forward to meet him and clasped him
in her arms. "Oh, my boy, my boy," she sobbed, and she could say no
more.

Ernest was as white as a sheet. His heart beat so that he could hardly
breathe. He let his mother embrace him, and then withdrawing himself
stood silently before her with the tears falling from his eyes.

At first he could not speak. For a minute or so the silence on all sides
was complete. Then, gathering strength, he said in a low voice:

"Mother," (it was the first time he had called her anything but "mamma"?)
"we must part." On this, turning to the warder, he said: "I believe