My mother was no less overjoyed. She had justified herself at last, and
if she was happy enough at the beginning in the tingling delight of the
woman who is about to know the sweetest of human joys, the joy of
bearing a child, she acquiesced at length in the accepted idea that her
child would be a boy. Perhaps she was moved to this merely by a desire
to submit to her husband's will, and to realise his hopes and
expectations. Or perhaps she had another reason, a secret reason, a
reason that came of her own weakness and timidity as a woman, namely,
that the man child to be born of her would be strong and brave and free.

All went well down to the end of autumn, and then alarming news came
from Castle Raa. The old lord had developed some further malady and was
believed to be sinking rapidly. Doctor Conrad was consulted and he gave
it as his opinion that the patient could not live beyond the year. This
threw my father into a fever of anxiety. Sending for his advocate, he
took counsel both with him and with Father Dan.

"Come now, let us get the hang of this business," he said; and when he
realised that (according to the terms of the ancient Patent) if the old
lord died before his child was born, his high-built hopes would be in
the dust, his eagerness became a consuming fire.

For the first time in his life his excitement took forms of religion and
benevolence. He promised that if everything went well he would give a
new altar to Our Lady's Chapel in the parish church of St. Mary, a ton
of coals to every poor person within a radius of five miles, and a
supper to every inhabitant of the neighbouring village who was more than
sixty years of age. It was even rumoured that he went so far in secret
as to provide funds for the fireworks with which some of his flatterers