The Argosy — page 113: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

The Village Blacksmith. 10F have wished to have been spared a few years longer, at least till she was married; for she dreaded leaving her sweet but wilful little daughter, knowing as she did how little sympathy there was between Vera and her father. Now that Rex, to whom Vera was devoted, was gone so far away and her mother was about to depart to a still more distant land—the land that is very far off—the child would be sadly lonely. After her interview with Father Ambrose, Mrs. Tempest sent for Vera, who was still ignorant of her mother’s dangerous state. Indeed, the girl, on whose young life the light of love had just broken, was inclined to look at everything through rose-coloured glasses, and so had been less anxious about her mother than she would have been at another time. She was therefore almost stunned when her pretty, gentle mother told her she believed her hours were numbered and her end very near. Vera could not believe it, still less could she realise it, as Mrs, Tempest saw. “It is true, Vera, darling; and before I go I want to tell you what I feel I ought to have told you long ago; but I yielded to your father’s wishes, feeling they were but natural. You were baptised by Father Ambrose, Vera ‘* I, mamma!” interrupted Vera. ** Yes, dearest. Both you and Rex, by your father’s consent, though he stipulated that you should be brought up in his faith until you were twenty-one, and then you were to be allowed to choose for yourselves to which faith you would belong. Till then I was not to influence you except by my prayers, and I am afraid, I can truly say, I have kept my promise only too well. But now that I am on the verge of the grave 33 ‘Don’t, mamma!” pleaded Vera in her distress. ‘© My dear, we must bravely face the truth,” gently returned her mother. ‘Now that I am about to leave you, I see things froma very different point of view, and I implore you, Vera, when you are of age to embrace the faith you were baptised into. Do not rest till you have satisfied yourself that it is right for you to do this, and get Father Ambrose, whom your father respects and likes, to help you. Tell Rex what I have told you, for though he is twenty-three he is still ignorant of it, and deeply do I regret that I let him go abroad without telling him. And pray, my darling, that your mother may be forgiven for having loved her husband more than the souls of her children.” Vera heard, but her mind was so full of the thought that her darling mother was dying that she scarcely took in the rest at the time. Religion was not a subject that interested her; she seldom gave ita thought. It seemed quite natural to her that her mother, who was French, was also a Catholic, and that her father being English should be consequently a Protestant. She now learnt that she was a Catholic by baptism, but the inconsistent conduct of her COnmicloooel —_— SS (CO