Shaded in her hand. She bent heedfully and warily over him, scarcely

Breathing, in her suppressed excitement, and suddenly flashed the light in his

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face and struck the floor by his ear with her knuckles. The sleeper's eyes

Sprung wide open, and he cast a startled stare about him — but he made no

Special movement with his hands.

The poor woman was smitten almost helpless with surprise and grief; but she

Contrived to hide her emotions, and to soothe the boy to sleep again; then she

Crept apart and communed miserably with herself upon the disastrous result

of her experiment. She tried to believe that her Tom's madness had banished

this habitual gesture of his; but she could not do it. 'No,' she said, 'his hands

Are not mad, they could not unlearn so old a habit in so brief a time. Oh, this

is a heavy day for me!'

Still, hope was as stubborn now as doubt had been before; she could not bring

Herself to accept the verdict of the test; she must try the thing again — the

Failure must have been only an accident; so she startled the boy out of his

Sleep a second and a third time, at intervals — with the same result which had

Marked the first test — then she dragged herself to bed, and fell sorrowfully

asleep, saying, 'But I cannot give him up — oh, no, I cannot — he must be my

boy!'

The poor mother's interruptions having ceased, and the prince's pains having