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"You were right," returned the rector; "the poor doctor's love for the child was talked about everywhere. As for Margaret Dornham, I do not think, if she had been her own, she could have loved her better. Whatever else may have gone wrong, take my word for it, there was no lack of love for the child; she could not have been better cared for of that I am quite sure."

"Buy all that is needful for the little one," he said. In all things Margaret Dornham promised obedience. One would have thought she had found a great treasure. To her kindly, womanly heart, the fact that she once more held a little child in her arms was a source of the purest happiness The only drawback was when she reached home, and her husband laughed coarsely at the sad little story.

"I have nothing to confide," returned Lord Arleigh; "all I can say to you on leaving is that I hope you will come to your senses and repent of your past wickedness." "I shall begin to think that you are a missionary in disguise," said Henry Dornham. "So you will not offer me anything for my secret?" he interrogated.

He tried to recover himself, while Henry Dornham went on: "The rich never have anything to do with the poor without harm comes of it. Why did they send me to the duke's house? Why did be try to patronize me? Why did he parade his gold and silver plate before my eyes?" The passion of his words seemed to inflame him.

Mrs. Dornham came hurrying in. "Look!" said Lord Mountdean. "I have been as careful as I could, but that is your work." Margaret Dornham knelt by the side of the senseless girl. "I would give my life to undo my past folly," she said. "Oh, my lord, can you ever forgive me?"

It was true Margaret Dornham was not an educated woman, but in her way she was refined. She was gentle, tender-hearted, thoughtful, patient, above all, Madaline believed she was her mother and she had never longed for her mother's love and care as she did now, when health, strength, and life seemed to be failing her.

The three years had almost elapsed; the doctor was dead, and had left nothing behind him that could give any clew to Madaline's identity, and in a short time she trembled to think how short the father would come to claim his child, and she would lose her. When she thought of that, Margaret Dornham clung to the little one in a passion of despair.

Lord Arleigh's first feeling was one of great surprise Henry Dornham was so different from what he had expected to find him; he had not thought that he would be fair like Madaline, but he was unprepared for the dark, swarthy, gypsy-like type of the man before him. The two looked steadily at each other; the poacher did not seem in the least to stand in awe of his visitor.

His death was instantaneous; and on the bright June afternoon when he was to have taken little Madaline for a drive, he was carried home, through the sunlit streets, dead. Margaret Dornham and the little child sat waiting for him when the sad procession stopped at the door. "The doctor is dead!" was the cry from one to another. A terrible pain shot through Margaret's head. Dead!

"What can be the woman's motive?" the earl would cry, in despair. "Why has she taken the child? What does she intend to do with it?" It never occurred to him that her great, passionate love for the little one was the sole motive for the deed she had done. The papers were filled with appeals to Margaret Dornham to return to Castledene, or to give some intelligence of her foster-child.