e we go back. I want to have my mother with me, judge.
It's better for a fellow to have that home-feeling in a large place from
the start; it keeps him out of a lot of things, and I don't pretend to
be better than other people, or not more superhuman. If I've been able
to keep out of scrapes, it's more because I've had my mother near me,
and I don't intend ever to be separated from her, after this, till I
have a home of my own. She's been the guiding-star of my life."

Kenton was unable to make any formal response, and, in fact, he was so
preoccupied with the question whether the fellow was more a fool or
a fraud that he made no answer at all, beyond a few inarticulate
grumblings of assent. These sufficed for Bittridge, apparently, for he
went on contentedly: "Whenever I've been tempted to go a little wild,
the thought of how mother would feel has kept me on the track like
nothing else would. No, judge, there isn't anything in this world like a
good mother, except the right kind of a wife."

Kenton rose, and said he believed he must go upstairs. Bittridge said,
"All right; I'll see you later, judge," and swung easily off to advise
with the clerk as to the best theatre.

VI.

Kenton was so unhappy that he could not wait for his wife to come to him
in their own room; he broke in upon her and Ellen in the parlor, and at
his coming the girl flitted out, in the noiseless fashion which of late
had made her father feel something ghostlike in her. He was afraid
she was growing to dislike him, and trying to avoid him, and now he
presented himself quite humbly before his wife, as if he had done wrong
in coming. He began with a sort of apology for interrupting, but his
wife said it was all right, and she added, "We were not talking about
anything in particular." She was silent, and then she added again:
"Sometimes I think Ellen hasn't very fine perceptions, after all. She
doesn't seem to feel about people as I supposed she would."

"You mean that she doesn't feel as you would suppose about those
people?"

Mrs. Kenton answered, obliquely. "She thinks it's a beautiful thing in
him to be so devoted to his mother."

"Humph! And what does she think of his mother?"

"She thinks she has very pretty hair."

Mrs. Kenton looked gravely down at the work she had in her hands, and
Kenton did not know what to make of it all. He decided that his wife
must feel, as he did, a doubt of the child's sincerity, with sense of
her evasi