"You are?" Alice cried, with a sudden vigour. "Yon are?"
"I'm sure he's good, yes—and if he isn't, it's not his fault. It's mine."
"What nonsense!"
"No, it's true," Mrs. Adams lamented. "I tried to bring him up to be good, God knows; and when he was little he was the best boy I ever saw. When he came from Sunday-school he'd always run to me and we'd go over the lesson together; and he let me come in his room at night to hear his prayers almost until he was sixteen. Most boys won't do that with their mothers—not nearly that long. I tried so hard to bring him up right—but if anything's gone wrong it's my fault."
"How could it be? You've just said———"
"It's because I didn't make your father take this—this new step earlier. Then Walter might have had all the advantages that other———"
"Oh, mama, please!" Alice begged her. "Let's don't go over all that again. Isn't it more important to think what's to be done about him? Is he going to be allowed to go on disgracing us as he does?"
Mrs. Adams sighed profoundly. "I don't know
