So those good people in the lonely parish of Billingsfield gathered round Mary Goddard, as they called her then, and round poor little Nellie, and did their best to protect the mother and the child from harm and undeserved suffering; and afterwards, when it was all over, and there was nothing more to be feared in the future, they looked into each other’s faces and felt that they were become as brothers and sisters, and that so long as they should live—­may it be long indeed!—­there was a bond between them which could never be broken.  So it was that Mrs. Ambrose’s face softened and her voice was less severe than it had been.

Mary Juxon is the happiest of women; happy in her husband, in her eldest daughter, in John Short and in the little children with bright faces and ringing voices who nestle at her knee or climb over the sturdy sailor-squire, and pull his great beard and make him laugh.  They will never know, any more than Nellie knew, all that their mother suffered; and as she looks upon them and strokes their long fair hair and listens to their laughter, she says to herself that it was perhaps almost worth while to have been dragged down towards the depths of shame for the sake of at last enjoying such pride and glory of happy motherhood.

THE END.

THE COMPLETE WORKS OF F. MARION CRAWFORD

      I. Mr. Isaacs
     II.  Doctor Claudius
    III.  To Leeward
     IV.  A Roman Singer
      V. An American Politician
     VI.  Marzio’s Crucifix Zoroaster
    VII.  A Tale of a Lonely Parish
   VIII.  Paul Patoff
     IX.  Love in Idleness:  A Tale of Bar Harbor Marion Darche
      X. Saracinesca
     XI.  Sant’ Ilario
    XII.  Don Orsino
   XIII.  Corleone:  A Sicilian Story
    XIV.  With the Immortals
     XV.  Greifenstein
    XVI.  A Cigarette-Maker’s Romance Khaled
   XVII.  The Witch of Prague
  XVIII.  The Three Fates
    XIX.  Taquisara
     XX.  The Children of the King
    XXI.  Pietro Ghisleri
   XXII.  Katharine Lauderdale
  XXIII.  The Ralstons
   XXIV.  Casa Braccio (Part I)
    XXV.  Casa Braccio (Part II)
   XXVI.  Adam Johnstone’s Son A Rose of Yesterday
  XXVII.  Via Crucia
 XXVIII.  In the Palace of the King
   XXIX.  Marietta:  A Maid of Venice
    XXX.  Cecilia:  A Story of Modern Rome
   XXXI.  The Heart of Rome
  XXXII.  Whosoever Shall Offend