"
"Ralph," said Sharpman, turning to the boy, "stand up!"
The lad arose.
"Have you seen this boy before?" continued the lawyer, addressing the
witness again.
"I have," she replied, "on several occasions."
"Are you familiar with his face, his expression, his manner?"
"To a great extent--yes, sir."
"Do you recognize him as your son Ralph?"
She looked down, long and searchingly, into the boy's face, and then
replied, deliberately, "No, sir, I do not."
"That is all, Mrs. Burnham."
Ralph was surprised and disappointed. He had not quite expected this.
He had thought she would say, perhaps, that she would receive him as
her son when his claim was duly proven. He would not have wondered
at that, but that she should positively, under oath, deny their
relationship to each other, had not been to him, before, within the
range of possibility. His brightness and enthusiasm were quenched
in a moment, and a chill crept up to his heart, as he saw the lady
come down from the witness-stand, throw her widow's veil across her
face, and resume her seat at the table. The case had taken on a new,
strange, harsh aspect in his sight. It seemed to him that a barrier
had been suddenly erected between him and the lady whom he had learned
to love as his mother; a barrier which no verdict of the jury or
judgment of the court, even though he should receive them, would help
him to surmount.
Of what use were these things, if motherly recognition was to be
denied him? He began to feel that it would be almost better to go back
at once to the not unpleasant home with Bachelor Billy, than to try to
grasp something which, it now seemed, was lying beyond his reach.
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