e are impatiently awaiting your return. In your absence she seems
almost like a daughter to me. She joins me in the hope that your
lawsuits are progressing favorably, and that you will be with us soon.
. . .

On your way home, if it does not keep you away from us too long, would
it not be well for you to come by way of Patesville, and find out
whether there is any prospect of our being able to collect our claim
against old Mr. Duncan McSwayne's estate? You must have taken the
papers with you, along with the rest, for I do not find them here.
Things ought to be settled enough now for people to realize on some of
their securities. Your grandfather always believed the note was good,
and meant to try to collect it, but the war interfered. He said to me,
before he died, that if the note was ever collected, he would use the
money to buy a wedding present for your wife. Poor father! he is dead
and gone to heaven; but I am sure that even there he would be happier
if he knew the note was paid and the money used as he intended.

If you go to Patesville, call on my cousin, Dr. Ed. Green, and tell him
who you are. Give him my love. I haven't seen him for twenty years.
He used to be very fond of the ladies, a very gallant man. He can
direct you to a good lawyer, no doubt. Hoping to see you soon,

Your loving mother,
ELIZABETH TRYON.

P. S. Blanche joins me in love to you.

This affectionate and motherly letter did not give Tryon unalloyed
satisfaction. He was glad to hear that his mother was well, but he had
hoped that Blanche Leary might have finished her visit by this time.
The reasonable inference from the letter was that Blanche meant to
await his return. Her presence would spoil the fine romantic flavor of
the surprise he had planned for his mother; it would never do to expose
his bride to an unannounced meeting with the woman whom he had tacitly
rejected. There would be one advantage in such a meeting: the
comparison of the two women would be so much in Rena's favor that his
mother could not hesitate for a moment between them. The situation,
however, would have elements of constraint, and he did not care to
expose either Rena or Blanche to any disagreeable contingency. It
would be better to take his wife on a wedding trip, and notify his
mother, before he returned home, of his marriage. In the extremely
improbable case that she should disapprove his choice after having see