dow. The truth is, I begun to think
uncomfortably of the dedication.

I went to the window because, undoubtedly, it would be easier to address
her severely from behind, and I wanted to say something that would sting
her.

"When you have quite done, ma'am," I said, after a long pause, "perhaps
you will allow me to say a word."

I could see the back of her head only, but I knew, from David's face,
that she had given him a quick look which did not imply that she was
stung. Indeed I felt now, as I had felt before, that though she
was agitated and in some fear of me, she was also enjoying herself
considerably.

In such circumstances I might as well have tried to sting a sand-bank,
so I said, rather off my watch, "If I have done all this for you, why
did I do it?"

She made no answer in words, but seemed to grow taller in the chair, so
that I could see her shoulders, and I knew from this that she was now
holding herself conceitedly and trying to look modest. "Not a bit of it,
ma'am," said I sharply, "that was not the reason at all."

I was pleased to see her whisk round, rather indignant at last.

"I never said it was," she retorted with spirit, "I never thought for
a moment that it was." She added, a trifle too late in the story,
"Besides, I don't know what you are talking of."

I think I must have smiled here, for she turned from me quickly, and
became quite little in the chair again.

"David," said I mercilessly, "did you ever see your mother blush?"

"What is blush?"

"She goes a beautiful pink colour."

David, who had by this time broken my connection with the head office,
crossed to his mother expectantly.

"I don't, David," she cried.

"I think," said I, "she will do it now," and with the instinct of a
gentleman I looked away. Thus I cannot tell what happened, but presently
David exclaimed admiringly, "Oh, mother, do it again!"

As she would not, he stood on the fender to see in the mantel-glass
whether he could do it himself, and then Mary turned a most candid face
on me, in which was maternity rather than reproach. Perhaps no look
given by woman to man affects him quite so much. "You see," she said
radiantly and with a gesture that disclosed herself to me, "I can
forgive even that. You long ago earned the right to hurt me if you want
to."

It weaned me of all further desire to rail at Mary, and I felt an
uncommon drawing to her.

"And if I did think that for a little while--," she went on, with