ill as to need a
hospital nurse."

"Her mother, Mrs. Comerford. You did not satisfy her in all those
years since you took her from my breast. I take her back again."

CHAPTER XXVII

THE STORY IS TOLD

Lady O'Gara's first terror was of a scene which should waken Stella and
alarm her in her weak state. She made as if to stand between the two
women: she looked fearfully for the signs of the rising storm as she
remembered them in Mrs. Comerford, the heaving breast, the working
hands, the dilated nostrils. But there were none of these signs.
Instead Mrs. Comerford was curiously quiet.

For a moment the quietness seemed to possess the little house. In the
silence you might have heard a pin drop. Shot sighed windily under the
table and Keep laid his nose along his paws and turned eyes of worship
on his mistress. Long afterwards Mary O'Gara remembered these things
and how the wind sprang up and drove a few dead leaves against the
window with a faint tinkling sound.

Then the momentary tense silence was broken.

"You are Stella's mother--Terence's..."

What she would have said was for ever unsaid.

"Your son's wife, Mrs. Comerford," said Mrs. Wade proudly. She held
out her hand with a gesture which had a strange dignity. On the
wedding finger was a thin gold ring.

There was a silence, a gasp. Mrs. Comerford leant across the table and
stared at the ring.

"Terence's wife!" she repeated slowly. "You don't expect me to believe
that! Why, my God, if it were true"--her voice rose to a sudden
anguish--"if it were true, if it could be true--why didn't you tell me
long ago? Why did you let me go on thinking such things of my boy? I
won't believe it. I tell you I won't believe it. You would have been
quick enough to step into my place, old Judy Dowd's granddaughter! Is
it likely you'd have gone all these years without your child--in
disgrace--the mother of a child born out of wedlock? It's a lie--Bride
Sweeney, it's a lie!"

"It is not a lie," Mrs. Wade said wearily. "I know it seems
incredible. There is no difficulty about proof. We were married in
Dublin, when Terence was at the Royal Barracks and I was staying with
Maeve McCarthy, a school-friend. She was my bridesmaid."

Mrs. Comerford put a bewildered hand to her head. Her other hand
clutched the rail of a chair as though her head reeled. Lady O'Gara
and Terence looked on as spectators, out of it, though passionately
interested. Lady