"Don't you want to hear about my journey?" he asked, kindly.
She did indeed want to hear. She was suffering from a burning inquisitiveness, yet she affected indifference, and said, coldly, "I do, if you will tell me the truth."
"No, but I daresay you will begin now,--'by their fruits ye shall know them.' I thought you were never going to get married."
"You had better sit down, and I will tell you how it happened," he said, soothingly.
Mrs. Prymmer hesitated, then, dominated by his slightly imperious manner and her own ungovernable curiosity, she took on the air of a suffering martyr, and reseated herself.
There was a large mirror over the mantelpiece, and the young man, catching in it a glimpse of the contrast between his own pale face and the ruddy one of his mother, murmured, "You are very fresh-looking for fifty-five years."
It was not like Justin Mercer to make a remark about the personal appearance of man, woman, or child. His mother glanced at him in surprise, then for a brief space of time was mollified by his approval of her comfortable appearance, although she murmured a stern reference to gray hairs that are brought down by sorrow to the grave.
"Your face is full," he went on, in his composed voice, "and your hair is thick and glossy like a girl's, and your eyes are bright,--as bright as Derrice's there--"
The mention of his wife's name was inopportune. "Is that what you call her?" asked his mother, with a scornful compression of the lips.
Mrs. Prymmer's countenance grew purple. "She is not a daughter of that man?"
"Help, Lord, for the godly man ceaseth," murmured the lady, upon whom these repeated blows were beginning to have the effect of inducing irrelevancy of Scripture quotations.
"If you like, I will tell you from the first," said her son.
"Do you want her to hear?" asked Mrs. Prymmer, with a glance toward the sliding doors that divided the two rooms.
The young man's face changed quickly, and muttering, "It would be just like her to listen,--the little witch," he got up and approached the doors.
"Hello," said a mischievous voice, and he caught a gleam of bright eyes and a smiling face at the gaping crack. Hastily opening the doors, he passed through, and, firmly closing them behind him, stood over the beautiful but slightly unformed and undeveloped figure sitting on the sofa, that was drawn close up to the doors.