She was evidently very much perturbed and very anxious about something connected with her youngest son, whom I had met for the first time two days previously, and about whose affairs, I need scarcely say, I was in a state of profound ignorance. The little mother was anxious not to "give him away," nor betray confidences, and so her words were very guarded. There was evidently nothing in the least dishonourable or in any way unworthy of her son in question. I gathered, rather, that he might be contemplating some step which she, from her wider outlook, considered undesirable and inexpedient; possibly even disastrous in the future.
It was no business of mine, and I make it a point of honour not to "try to guess" more than I am told, and to forget what I am told as soon as possible, where the affairs of other people are involved.
This is, fortunately, easy for me as a rule, but in this case one sentence remains even now ringing in my ears, and if the son ever comes across this record I hope he will forgive my reproducing his mother's last beautiful words to me:
"Tell my darling boy that life is so solemn and true love so sacred a thing. Tell him to be very, very sure, lest he lose the substance in pursuing the shadow."
The first sentence is given verbatim. In the second my memory may be producing the sense without the exact wording, but I have no doubt at all that my words practically convey what the mother wished me to "tell her boy."
This message gave me a hard problem to solve: "What should I do with it?"
On the one hand, my having agreed to take the message, tacitly bound me to let him have it.
On the other hand, there were various questions to consider. In the first place, Mr Blake-Mason might probably, and very naturally, resent my writing to him on the subject, especially as I had no reason to suppose he had any knowledge of psychic matters.
Secondly, he might suppose (quite untruly) that I had heard some private affairs of his discussed, and had taken upon myself to convey a personal warning, under cover of his dead mother's wishes.
This was perhaps exaggerating a possibility, which, nevertheless, could not be ignored.