lift her eyes, yet. "How long shall you have to visit
over there?"

"I've made my last professional visit."

"Where are you going this morning?"

"To Jocelyn's."

Mrs. Mulbridge now looked up, and met her son's eye. "What makes you
think she'll have you?"

He did not shrink at her coming straight to the point the moment the way
was clear. He had intended it, and he liked it. But he frowned a little
as he said, "Because I want her to have me, for one thing." His jaw
closed heavily, but his face lost a certain brutal look almost as
quickly as it had assumed it. "I guess," he said, with a smile, "that
it's the only reason I've got."

"You no need to say that," said his mother, resenting the implication
that any woman would not have him.

"Oh, I'm not pretty to look at, mother, and I'm not particularly young;
and for a while I thought there might be some one, else."

"Who?"

"The young fellow that came with her, that day."

"That whipper-snapper?"

Dr. Mulbridge assented by his silence. "But I guess I was mistaken. I
guess he's tried and missed it. The field is 'clear, for all I can see.
And she's made a failure in one way, and then you know a woman is in
the humor to try it in another. She wants a good excuse for giving up.
That's what I think."

"Well," said his mother, "I presume you know what you're about, Rufus!"

She took up the coffee-pot on the lid of which she had been keeping her
hand, and went into the kitchen with it. She removed the dishes, and
left him sitting before the empty table-cloth. When she came for that,
he took hold of her hand, and looked up into her face, over which a
scarcely discernible tremor passed. "Well, mother?"

"It's what I always knew I had got to come to, first or last. And I
suppose I ought to feel glad enough I did n't have to come to it at
first."

"No!" said her son. "I'm not a stripling any longer." He laughed,
keeping his mother's hand.

She freed it and taking up the table-cloth folded it lengthwise and then
across, and laid it neatly away in the cupboard. "I sha'n't interfere
with you, nor any woman that you bring here to be your wife. I've had my
day, and I'm not one of the old fools that think they're going to have
and to hold forever. You've always been a good boy to me, and I guess
you hain't ever had to complain' of your mother stan'in' in your way. I
sha'n't now. But I did think--"

She stopped and shut her lips firmly. "Speak up, mother!" he cried.