would take her away, leaving him behind, Geoff
resolved that he would say nothing about it, that he would not make her
unhappy. He would bear it; one could bear anything when one tried, even
spending the holidays by one's self. But his heart sank at the thought.
Supposing she were to stay a month away,--that was four weeks; it was
thirty days,--and he alone, all alone in Markland. And when she came
back it would be time for him to go to school. Sometimes he felt as if
he must cry out when he thought of this; but he would not say a word,
he would not complain; he would bear it rather than vex mamma. When she
came downstairs she was so pale. She began to walk about a little, but
only with Warrender's arm. She drove out, but the babies had to be with
her in the carriage; there was no room for Geoff. He twisted his poor
little face out of shape altogether in the effort to get rid of the
scalding tears, but he would not betray the state of his mind; nothing,
he vowed to himself, should make him worry mamma.

One day he rode over to the Warren, pondering upon what Theo had said,
that the Warren must be liked best by the babies, because it was their
home. Would it ever really be their home? Would Warrender be so hard as
that, to take away mamma and the babies for good, and leave a fellow
all alone in Markland, because it was Geoff's and not his own? Geoff's
little gray face was as serious as that of a man of eighty, and almost
as full of wrinkles. He thought and thought what he could do to please
Warrender. Though his heart rose against this interloper, this destroyer
of his home, Geoff was wise, and knew that to keep his mother he must
please her husband. What could he do? Not like him,--that was impossible.
Riding along, now slowly, now quickly, rather at the pony's will than
at his own, Geoff, with loose reins in his hands and a slouch in his
shoulders which was the despair of Black, pondered the subject till his
little mind was all in confusion. What could he do to please Warrender?
He would be good to the babies, by nature, and because he liked the two
funny little things, but that would not please Warrender. He would do
almost anything Warrender chose to tell him, but that wouldn't please
him. What was there, then, that would? He did not know what he could
do. He rode very carelessly, almost as much at the mercy of the pony as
on the occasion when Theo picked him from under the wheels of the high
phaeton; but either the p