AN ONLY SON

“’Ave you ’eard as Widow Collins’ lad be down from London, Mr. Barfield?” said a little spare woman who stood willingly patient before the counter of a small shop and watched the grocer’s deft fingers pack up a neighbour’s tea and sugar before attending to her own demands.

It was dark, for it was eventide, and the shop did not face the sunset that was going on brilliantly behind the pines at the top of the village street; but any one could have told from the tone of the voice that there was something more than common about Widow Collins’ lad.

Mr. Barfield lit an odoriferous paraffin lamp and hung it to a hook on the low ceiling, amid a wonderful collection of boots and hats and sunshades, of kettles and coils of rope and saucepans—and of Spanish onions on strings.

“What, he that’s clerk in the London Post Office?” asked the other customer with sudden interest.

“I never ’eard as she had no other, Mrs. Neave,” answered the first speaker half crossly, for she was not pleased that the grocer should give more attention to business than to her news; “and I s’pose its ’cause he’s the only one that she see’d fit to bring ’im up above ’is station.” The lamp lit up a thin, pinched face that had once been pretty with that frail, trivial prettiness that seems so strangely ill-fitted for the hard life of daily labour, where it is nevertheless so common. Mrs. Cave drew her ill-fitting little black jacket around her with an irritability of gesture that told in itself how perpetual struggles and over-fatigue had wrought on her. She had had no chance of bringing up any one of her seven boys above his station, for laundry work only brought in a fair pittance in the summer time, when the place was full of visitors, and Widow Collins had the monopoly of the all-the-year-round families.

“Ah, it’s a sad mistake to bring ’em up above their stations,” said Mrs. Neave piously, as she gathered up her purchases. “We’re sure to be punished for it in the long run, as Mrs. Collins is bound to be one o’ these days.” Mrs. Neave, being a plumber’s wife, considered herself just a cut above laundresses, and patronized them accordingly.

“Ah, how’s that?” asked Mr. Barfield, quite interested now, though he ran busily round to the other side of the shop at the same time to fetch a skein of yarn from his haberdashery counter for Mrs. Cave; “I thought the lad was doin’ well, though to be sure pride is sure to ’ave a fall.” As the prop and stay of the Dissenting Chapel round the corner, Mr. Barfield often felt it his duty to add a pinch of righteousness to his customers’ purchases to make up the weight, and Mrs. Neave, being the wife of a fellow-warden, required special attention in this particular.

But Mrs. Cave tossed her head; though she was no warden’s wife she needed no one to tell her how old Mrs. Collins was being punished, for, secretive as was that absent lady, the little laundress would have wormed the heart out of a stone. Manners, however, forbade that she should take the word out of a neighbour’s mouth, so she held her peace, though it was pain and grief to her, and let the plumber’s wife take up the tale again.

“Well, the lad have married a woman with money, to be sure,” continued that lady, sadly, almost as though she were grieved to have to allow the fact, "but they do say"—and from the tone of the voice it was to be supposed that Mrs. Neave knew of circumstances that would have mitigated the joys of that match, but she was not permitted to make them known.

The grocer himself interrupted her.

“So I did ’ear,” he said quickly, almost betraying a certain satisfaction of his own at being able to add his mite to the gossip, “in the fish-trade.”

“I know nothin’ about that,” began Mrs. Neave again, feebly peevish, but at this open avowal of incompetence Mrs. Cave could keep peace no longer. It was more than flesh and blood could stand, and she burst in scornfully.

“Fish-trade, indeed,” cried she. “Why, it’s a restaurant, and a smart one too, in some part o’ London they calls ’Igh ’Olborn. But though he did catch her with that ’andsome, softy face o’ his, she be that sort of a person she won’t look at ’is poor relations, and won’t so much as let ’im ask ’is own mother to ’is own ’ouse.”

Mrs. Cave looked triumphantly round for her effect, and she got it.

The plumber’s wife ejaculated,[ejaculated,] “Well, I never!” and was speechless, though whether her emotion resulted from horror at the younger Mrs. Collins’ arrogance, or from astonishment at Mrs. Cave’s audacity in taking the speech from off her very tongue was not clear; and Mr. Barfield made a strange little noise with his lips indicative of amazement and dismay, not unmixed with religious disapproval.

“And I should say it was more nor a year since he was even here to see her last,” said he sententiously. “And well I remember it must be fifteen year since she’s been alone to slave and toil for that boy.”

“Fifteen? Why, it be twenty,” cried the laundress. “And many’s the time I could swear she went without ’er dinner so as ’e should be schooled better than others. And shabby she’ll go to her dyin’ day—though one’d think she might take a bit of ’elp from ’im now as ’e’s got others to keep ’im, and she not so much as the bit o’ comfort o’ seein’ ’im now and again. But it be all ’er pride—it be pride as has kep’ ’er up all these years. Pride to ’ave ’im better than ’erself. And this is ’ow she’s served.”

There was an honest ring in Mrs. Cave’s indignation, and who was to tell—certainly not herself—that there was a spice of satisfaction in it as well?

“Poor soul!” murmured Mrs. Neave. “Though it do serve ’er right for settin’ up her horn as she do.”

“Well, there,” declared the grocer, returning to his usual cheeriness, “she’s got the satisfaction o’ seein’ him a gentleman. I suppose ’e’ll scarce pass the word to his old acquaintance as equals when ’e walks to church with ’er to-morrow mornin’. That ought to be a reward to any woman.”

“She’ll look us all in the face and no mistake to-morrow,” said Mrs. Cave, moving to the door, but even as she did so, envy and satisfaction were both merged in wonder pure and simple as she beheld striding down the village street in the dusk, the figure of a tall young man, bearing a large wicker basket under his arm.

“Well, I’m blest,” cried she, gasping, “if that ain’t—but, no, it never can be Johnnie Collins!”

Mrs. Neave was at her side in a moment, and Mr. Barfield sidled quickly from behind his counter and stood beside the two women at the door.

“Well, I never!” ejaculated Mrs. Neave again. “Why, he’s carrying his mother’s linen ’ome same as he used to do before he went to London!”

Mr. Barfield whistled, and they all three stood staring commiseratingly at the handsome youth, who quite unconcernedly swung along the road and disappeared down a bye-lane at the corner. “Well, I wouldn’t ha’ believed it not if you’d ha’ told me!” murmured Mrs. Cave. And at the same time, her eyes wandering to Mr. Barfield’s face, went past him down the hill, and saw Widow Collins herself toiling a little painfully up towards the shop from the sea. “Hush!” she whispered, dragging Mrs. Neave within again, “’ere she comes, I do declare!”

They all stood waiting, and the widow came on slowly, looking neither to right nor to left. She passed the shop, at first noting none of them, but then turned back and, merely giving a casual nod to Mrs. Neave as she brushed by her, walked straight in and up to the counter, whither Mr. Barfield had quickly retreated.

“A pound of Dutch cheese,” said she shortly, without preliminary greeting of any sort. “A nice fresh cut, please.”

She looked at the cheese and not at Mr. Barfield. She was a hard-featured woman—thin and tall, with sad keen eyes, wherein there was no gleam of the cheerfulness that some might have expected to see there because of that unwonted presence in her lonely home yonder.

“I ’ear you’ve your son ’ome, Mrs. Collins,” said Mr. Barfield, pleasantly, paring off the outer rind of the cheese as he spoke, for he knew the customers that he was forced to humour. “Married, ain’t he? Wife with him?”

“No,” answered the woman, shortly. “His wife is visitin’ her own folk.”

Mrs. Cave glanced at Mrs. Neave as who should say, “I told you so,” but the latter took it as a hint to proceed, and said quickly to the widow:

“Ah, but you’ll be goin’ up to London presently. That’ll be nicer for you than ’avin’ visitors at ’ome. She’s a well-to-do woman, ain’t she, your son’s wife? So she’ll ’ave time to leave her work a bit to show ye round the place.”

“Yes, she’s a rich woman,” answered the widow, looking the speaker in the face with that quiet self-satisfaction that was the special annoyance of the female portion of the village. “But if she ’ave got time to leave ’er work, I ’aven’t got time to leave mine. I’ve my customers to think of.”

Whether Mrs. Cave saw a covert taunt in this remark or not, it seemed somehow to goad her into speech.

“Well, anyways you must be rare and pleased to see your son just the same simple lad as ’e always was, now ’e could play the gentleman if he liked,” said she.

The remark should have seemed innocent enough, and what most mothers would have flushed with pride to hear, but Mrs. Cave was clever, and knew her prey.

The widow glanced at her sharply, uneasily, and laid her money down on the counter.

“Look alive, Mr. Barfield, please,” said she, “I’m late to-night.”

The slight was too great to be borne. Mrs. Cave moved to the doorway.

“Oh, you don’t need to ’urry,” said she, tartly. “’E be only just gone round the corner to the Parsonage with your basket o’ linen. ’E won’t be back just yet.”

A faint tremor ran through Mrs. Collins’ body even to the hand that she stretched out to take her parcel, but she said nothing, and to any observer less keen than the rival laundress, the tremor was but a shiver that was easily accounted for by the sea-fog that was slowly sweeping up across the marsh below.

“Well, I wish you joy o’ getting him back so well set up,” said Mr. Barfield, good-naturedly, as he tied the knot in the string. “It must do your ’eart good, I’m sure, to have him by to give you a ’and again when you ’ave to work for yourself all the year round.”

The widow looked at him, and in her eyes was a hardness that might well have chilled a braver man.

“Thank you,” she said coldly, “I don’t know as one day makes much odds.”

Mr. Barfield was silent, and so indeed was Mrs. Cave, but the plumber’s wife, blundering on, said patronizingly:

“There now, you oughtn’t to take it so ungrateful, and him so nice and obliging to you. There’s some lads ’ud be so stuck up with being raised up—why, they might think it beneath ’em to do such a job!”

Mrs. Cave smiled, and then laughed outright, and the old woman’s eyes grew harder than ever.

Mr. Barfield brought her change—two coppers and a threepenny-bit—and laid it on the counter before her. She took it up without a word, nodded good-night a trifle more surlily than usual, and without unlocking her set lips or turning her eyes once upon either of the two women, passed out into the dusk. Her face was as thunder.

“Well, ’pon my word, it ain’t no sort o’ use tryin’ to be civil and kindly to ’er,” sighed Mrs. Neave; but Mr. Barfield, who had seen the widow’s face, felt a vague sense of pity rise in his calculating little soul, and said as he stuck his pen briskly behind his ear after “entering” Mrs. Neave’s purchase:

“We can’t always just tell, ye know. She may be glad enough to get a sight of ’im though she do talk so short, and as like as not she never sent him round with the linen at all.”

Mrs. Cave was already in the road; she was watching the mother, who set her face once more to the sunset, and, whipped by the creeping mist, struggled on to the cross-roads, where a line of straight pine-stems stood black against the sky that flamed beyond the downs: the downs were blue with mist and the sky was red—red and angry—and the spare bent figure made a spot upon it, and that little spot was the blackest in the whole scene.

“No,” said Mrs. Cave decisively, to those within, “I shouldn’t think she did send him round with it! I should like to know what a body’d want to spend years toilin’ and moilin’ for, except to have the boy cut a bit of a figure when ’e come back among them as knowed ’im a little dirty brat! She sent him indeed!”

Mrs. Cave stuck her sharp little nose in the air, and Mrs. Neave retorted stoutly:

“Well, if she didn’t send ’im, I should say she’d be all the better pleased. I s’pose she’s fond o’ the lad arter her fashion, though, to be sure, she showed it a queer way when ’e was little. My boys do say ’e was that frightened of her there was times when they’d a job to get him to go ’ome.”

“And yet,” put in the grocer, “I can call to mind the day when he fell into the river down yonder. Some one ran up and told ’er of it, and didn’t know whether the child was alive or dead, and they do say she went down all of a ’eap like a corpse of lead. And the doctor told my wife she’s never been the same woman since. And yet when the neighbours brought ’im in drippin’’ wet and queer—if she mustn’t needs go rating ’im for it all the while she was a puttin’ ’im to bed. I know she spoke quite sharp to me when I went round at night to ask after ’im, and yet I could swear I ’eard her cryin’ over ’im soft and a kissin’ of ’im whiles he slept, as I stood waitin’ at the door.”

“She’s a curious piece of goods,” sighed Mrs. Neave, “for though it don’t scarce seem like truth, I can recollect I see’d her once bring him a jam-tart to ’s tea when ’e was spudding thistles one day down in the marsh, and if you’d believe it, she kissed ’im just as one of us might ha’ done, ’cos he looked so pleased.” Mrs. Neave glanced at Mrs. Cave as one expecting to be disbelieved, but that shrewder lady only just looked her over and then burst into a loud laugh.

“Lord,” said she, “ye don’t understand the likes of ’er, that be certain!” and with a hasty nod to the company she passed on quickly up the street.

The after-glow had faded from the sky behind the downs, and the sea-mist had ceased to hurry across the marsh towards them, but had crumbled and massed itself into mounds and ridges that hung or floated over the wide, brown plain beneath the village—warmed and illumined by the rays of the bright October moon that had risen red out of the sea. Upon the little public terrace overhanging the marsh-land, the village lads were gathered for their evening pipe; they sat grouped beneath the thatched roof of the pent-house, men and boys together, while outside, upon the paved walk, a few women lounged with babies, taking their leisure too after the day’s labour. Mrs. Cave came down among them; she had given the family its supper, and had put a goodly portion of it to bed, but she had left the washing-up to her eldest girl—for Mrs. Cave was sighing for more gossip upon the great event of the day, and here she knew that she should find it.

“Be my Jim ’ere?” cried she, as she approached, alluding to her husband, who was indeed very rarely anywhere else, unless it were at the public-house.

“Yes, o’ course he be! Let the man ’ave his leisure a bit,” grinned a slatternly girl. And for the moment Mrs. Cave seemed only too much inclined to obey her.

For within with the men it was Johnnie Collins again, and Mrs. Cave’s keen eyes had noticed a black figure standing just opposite in the shadow of the old gateway, that gave zest to the situation.

“He might as well ha’ brought ’is smart missus round for us to ’ave a look at,” said one, “but I s’pose we ain’t fit for such as ’im now-a-days.”

“Lord, it ain’t Johnnie’s fault,” said another for Johnnie, though sometimes envied for the odd shillings he used to earn as a lad, through lending his handsome face and figure to be an artist’s model—had yet ever been a favourite, for he had been the easiest, most good-natured comrade in the world, and could always be led anywhere by any one.

“No, there ain’t no beastly pride about Johnnie!” declared a third, “but they say as ’is missus leads ’im a smarter dance nor ever ’is ’ard old mother did, and won’t let ’im come nigh the old lady now, so as ’e has to get away on the sly.”

Mrs. Cave strained her eyes, for she saw the gaunt figure creep out of the shadow at these words and quietly climb the village street; it was the widow as she had thought. Yes, and positively—lounging slowly down towards her—was that very son of hers in his elegant suit of grey homespun. It was as good as a play. Mrs. Cave hurried softly down the steps by the terrace and warily followed Widow Collins up the road. Curiosity was certainly Mrs. Cave’s besetting sin.

“Why, mother,” said the young man softly, “where have you been? I just went round to the Vicarage with your basket of linen, and when I got in again you were gone. Who would ever have thought to find you a-gossiping! But, there, indeed it does my heart good to see you hob-nobbing with the neighbours, and not so lonesome as you might be.”

The old woman took no note of this that to her might have seemed a weird jest. She did not even smile, but she said quickly: “I’m sorry you went round with the linen, John. There weren’t no call. I’ve got used to doing it myself now, and I don’t like it meddled with.”

“Why, I always used to,” he began.

But she interrupted him sharply. “Never you mind what you used to do,” she said pettishly, as though half ashamed of herself. “You ain’t here all the year round, nor I don’t want you—and what I do every week you needn’t to do just for once.”

“What, are you going to blame me now for being up in London,” he began, nervously laughing, “when it was you drove me there first?”

“Blame you!” she cried, and then stopped. “There,” she said, “you let me be, that’s all I want. I’ll see to myself so long as I’m above ground.”

He opened his mouth to speak, but she laid a quick, trembling hand on his coat-sleeve.

“Ye used to have to mind me,” she said, and her voice shook a little, “for, Lord knows, I was a bit ’ard with you o’ times! Ye’ve got to do other’s bidding now, and I’m glad on it. But ye’ll mind your mother to-day for the last time.”

Mrs. Cave, as she played eavesdropper, involuntarily thought of the day when her neighbour had seen the widow give a jam-tart to the lad on the sly, and she looked for her to kiss him now as she had kissed him then. But the old woman’s keen ear had caught the sound of the step behind her, and though the young fellow stooped towards her impulsively she pushed him back.

“Come,” she whispered, “let’s get ’ome to supper,” and she tried to hurry up the road, but not before Mrs. Cave had placed herself abreast of them, and holding out a friendly hand to Johnnie, had said effusively: “There, now, I thought it were Mr. Collins! But, ’pon my word, it be so long since we’ve seen you ’ere, there ain’t no knowing you again. And you so smart, too! Why, you’ll scare care to shake hands with a poor body like me.”

They all three stopped, and Johnnie blushed as he took her hand, perhaps with shame or perhaps with annoyance, knowing that the woman must have overheard his mother’s foregoing words—but the mother’s own face was as iron.

Mrs. Cave walked graciously on beside them, but the widow never glanced at her nor took any heed of her, but presently just stopped short in the road, and, hastily producing from her pocket the yellow envelope of a telegram, said quickly to her son: “There, I declare, I’d clean forgot! And I come down here on purpose to find ye too! The post-mistress brought this ’ere for ye.” And she held it out to him as she spoke.

The young man’s face fell a little, and he held the document in his hand as though fearing to open it.

He had stopped walking, and Mrs. Cave stopped too, and as neither mother nor son spoke she said pleasantly to the former: “Well, now I ’ope there’s no ill news to spoil your treat for you, Mrs. Collins, for I’m sure you’ll be proud to show him off to us all to-morrow o’ church time, and small blame to you. Though to be sure,” added she, turning to the young man, while the battered bow in her well-worn bonnet positively wagged with her eagerness, “ye might ha’ brought your wife with ye to see your old friends! For all folk do say she’s a lady born and bred, and it stands to reason we ain’t good enough for such as that.”

Mrs. Cave smiled, and Mrs. Collins’ face wore a mingled expression of pride and scorn, as she listened. She had forgotten the telegram; she lifted her head royally, gazing with satisfaction in her weary eyes at this handsome son of hers who was outwardly so like a gentleman that she might well be excused for thinking that folk really supposed him to be one. She thought he was one, and little guessed that she had blindly done her best to crush out of him those natural qualities of devotion and tenderness that were really the most like to what she desired him to be. If she had been angry with him for compromising his dignity, it was just because she was proud of him. She was proud even of his condescension to her. Yes, she was proud in secret to-night, but to-morrow she would be proud openly—before them all. It would be a triumph that would more than repay her for many patient years.

But Johnnie had opened the telegram. His face had changed; one could see it even in the shifting light of conflicting moon and twilight. There had been some sort of assurance in it before, and it had been gay and smiling; now it was tremulous, ashamed, and frightened.

He took out his watch, and the joyful pride faded out of the old woman’s face as she saw him do it.

“When’s the last train to Seacombe?” said he.

“Half-past nine,” answered Mrs. Cave, for the mother seemed suddenly to have lost the power of speech. “But whatever do you want to know that for?”

Johnnie turned to his mother. There was a sort of shame-faced humility in his attitude that belied an attempted swagger in his speech. “I shall have to go into Seacombe to-night, mother,” said he. “It’s very important. It’s—well, it’s business, you see, and a man must think of that first of all.”

“Lawk-a-mercy!” cried Mrs. Cave. “And you scarce ’ere a few hours! Why, there ain’t no business to do on a Saturday night, man! And you’ll never get a train back in time for church in the morning. You’d never disappoint your mother of that?”

But the old woman had recovered her composure now, and answered him.

“Business be always first,” said she, “to them as wants to get on in the world; and it wouldn’t be a mother as’d want her son to miss it. Come, John, there’ll just be time to get your supper afore ye go.”

The two went up the street together, and Mrs. Cave stood staring after them. Then she went back to the “Look-out,” and gave the benefit of her investigations to the village.

“It be my belief as that message were from ’is wife,” cried she. “It be my belief she was cross at ’im coming ’ere, and wasn’t going to let him stay a minute longer. And, Lord, any one might know he’d never dare say a masterful woman nay—be it wife or be it mother! Well, it serves the old soul right. She brought ’im up above ’is station, and she druv ’im and druv ’im all the time ’e was young, and, ’pon my word, ’e be just like a poor sheep as don’t know which way to run if there ain’t some one behind ’im with a stick.”

“Yet there’s good in the lad, I do believe,” said the grocer, who had just honoured the terrace for a few moments with his presence on his way home from the shop; “and one can’t choose but be sorry for the woman, for she’s worked ’ard for ’im.”

“Lor’ bless ye, she don’t mind,” laughed Mrs. Cave. “She’d rather ’ave ’im druv—though it be away from ’er—than not see ’im keep the ’igh road. She knows well enough as some one ’ave got to drive ’im. But we sha’n’t see Mrs. Collins at chapel to-morrow mornin’.”

In the latter part of her surmise Mrs. Cave was not correct. Mrs. Collins appeared at chapel, sternly neat in her rusty black, and was more gracious than she had ever been known to be before. As the little congregation poured out into the mellow autumn sunshine, where the birches were silver and yellow against the blue sky, and against the purple downs, and where the creepers lay crimson upon the grey walls of the cottages, a burly old farmer came up to her when she was returning Mrs. Cave’s commiserating greeting. “Why, Mrs. Collins, that son o’ your’s ’ave grown a smart young man, and no mistake,” said he. “I seen ’im get out o’ the train last night at Seacombe. There was a lady come to meet ’im. A fine dressed-up lady she were too, as might ha’ held up ’er ’ead with the best. It was ’is wife, as I made out. Lucy he called her.”

Mrs. Cave, who had pressed up to hear, shot a hasty glance at Mr. Barfield, and nodded her head.

But the widow did not notice it. Her eyes were far away on the dancing sea that shone so blue beyond the mile of yellow marsh where the street opened at the turn down the hill; she dropped the heavy lids over the triumph that was in them, but a flush crept to her sunken cheek, and she pressed her thin lips together as though to crush the smile that she knew hovered around them.

“Yes,” she said, demurely, “Lucy be the name of my son’s wife.”

“Well, and a handsome couple they make, then,” declared the farmer, “and well-to-do, too, as it seems. They druv off in a ’ired fly, they did. They’ll be driving over here next and driving you off along wi’ ’em.”

Again Mrs. Collins closed her lips over a smile. “I’m too old for strange places,” said she quietly.

“Well, well,” said the farmer, “you’ve a son to be proud of anyways. He’s done well for himself.”

Then Mrs. Collins lifted her eyes. “He ’ave done what I meant ’im to do,” she said slowly, “and I am proud of him.”

She stood a moment looking round upon them all one after another, as though tasting her triumph. Then she shook hands with the farmer, nodded to the rest, and went away slowly to her lonely cottage against the downs.

The farmer smiled rather foolishly, looking after her. He knew the widow but little. “Rather a queer sort of a body, ain’t she?” said he questioningly.

“Aye, sir, that she be indeed,” put in Mrs. Cave, the ever-ready. “If you’d believe it, she’d sooner never ’ave seed that son of hers again than ’ave ’ad ’im marry a girl of his own station as wouldn’t have took ’im away from ’er to make a gentleman of ’im. There’s pride for ye!”

The farmer looked surprised, but the grocer—approaching at that moment, fresh from his responsible Sunday duties in his irreproachable black clothes—put in his word cheerily.

“Oh,” said he, “the women make him out too bad. ’E’s not a bad sort. ’E’ll be sure to come back and see her again.”

And after that the congregation dispersed to their homes.

But though Johnnie Collins was not a bad sort, though he often begged his mother in a vague sort of way to come up to London and see him, and showed nothing but disappointment when she persistently refused, something always happened at the last moment to prevent him from coming down to see her.

He often wrote to her and often, too, sent her little sums of money, which the post-mistress declared she always cashed with a very sour face; and once his letter said that he intended to come and bring his little son to see grandmother. But “business” as usual intervened, and the little lad was sent down at last with a maidservant—the fresh air being considered beneficial for him after some childish ailment. Then it was that the old tree might have been said, as it were, to bloom afresh. All the tenderness that out of a Spartan pursuit of a distinct and difficult object had been withheld from her own boy’s childhood was lavished upon this little flower of her strange ambition.

Mrs. Cave and Mrs. Neave and Mr. Barfield all had tales to tell of this secret but undoubted transformation. The fair-haired babe and his stern grandmother were seen wandering along the lanes hand in hand as the twilight fell upon the day’s work, or when the August moon rose at the sun-setting—gold upon the golden harvest land. He was seen teazing her at the wash-tub, she patiently submitting, and she was even known beyond a doubt to have caught him in her arms in the open churchyard where the whole village might have seen her, and to have kissed him there to her heart’s content.

And even when that glad three weeks was over, and the boy went back to his parents, there were those who declared that the light never faded again from the old woman’s eyes till she was laid in the grave not two months afterwards.

Some one found her dead one day beside her own lonely fireside. In her hand was a letter from her son; it contained a £5 note, and said he wished it could have been more, but that they had an establishment to keep up now and their expenses were heavy.

Mrs. Neave was shocked, but Mrs. Cave declared that Johnnie had fulfilled all that his mother required of him, and that if she could but have known that he walked behind her coffin in a well-brushed suit of black broad-cloth, it would have added the last touch to her perfect satisfaction.

Be that as it may, and though the neighbours pitied her, there was a peaceful and a triumphant smile on the dead, old face.