ng just eaten a good dinner, was in a very agreeable
humor when, that same evening, his wife brought up again the subject of
their previous discussion.

"Phil," she asked, "Aunt Polly told me that once, long before my father
died, when she went to remonstrate with him for keeping that Woman in
the house, he threatened to marry Julia if Aunt Polly ever said another
word to him about the matter. Suppose he _had_ married her, and had then
left a will,--would the marriage have made any difference, so far as the
will was concerned?"

Major Carteret laughed. "Your Aunt Polly," he said, "was a remarkable
woman, with a wonderful imagination, which seems to have grown more
vivid as her memory and judgment weakened. Why should your father marry
his negro housemaid? Mr. Merkell was never rated as a fool,--he had one
of the clearest heads in Wellington. I saw him only a day or two before
he died, and I could swear before any court in Christendom that he was
of sound mind and memory to the last. These notions of your aunt were
mere delusions. Your father was never capable of such a folly."

"Of course I am only supposing a case," returned Olivia. "Imagining such
a case, just for the argument, would the marriage have been legal?"

"That would depend. If he had married her during the military
occupation, or over in South Carolina, the marriage would have been
legally valid, though morally and socially outrageous."

"And if he had died afterwards, leaving a will?"

"The will would have controlled the disposition of his estate, in all
probability."

"Suppose he had left no will?"

"You are getting the matter down pretty fine, my dear! The woman would
have taken one third of the real estate for life, and could have lived
in the homestead until she died. She would also have had half the other
property,--the money and goods and furniture, everything except the
land,--and the negro child would have shared with you the balance of the
estate. That, I believe, is according to the law of descent and
distribution."

Mrs. Carteret lapsed into a troubled silence. Her father _had_ married
the woman. In her heart she had no doubt of the validity of the
marriage, so far as the law was concerned; if one marriage of such a
kind would stand, another contracted under similar conditions was
equally as good. If the marriage had been valid, Julia's child had been
legitimate. The will she had burned gave this sister of hers--she
shuddered at the w