"Well, mother?"
"I have been thinking about our winter in Washington. I have been reflecting that myself and your sisters will have no natural protector there."
"You never had any in Paris or in London, mother, and yet you got on very well."
"That was a matter of necessity, then; you were a youth at college; we could not have your company; but now you are a young man, and your place, until you marry, is with me and my daughters. We shall need your escort, dear Herman, and be happier for your company. I should be very glad if I could induce to accompany us to the city."
"And I should be very glad to do so, dear mother, but for the engagements that bind me here."
She did not ask the very natural question of what those engagements might be. She did not wish to let him see that she knew or suspected his attachment to Nora Worth, so she answered:
"You refer to the improvements and additions you mean, to add to Brudenell Hall. Surely these repairs had better be deferred until the spring, when the weather will be more favorable for such work?"
"My dear mother, all the alterations I mean to have made inside the house can very well be done this winter. By the next summer I hope to have the whole place in complete order for you and my sisters to return and spend the warm weather with me."
The lady lifted her head. She had never known her son to be guilty of the least insincerity. If he had looked forward to the coming of herself and her daughters to Brudenell, to spend the next summer, he could not, of course, be contemplating the removal of Nora Worth to the house.
"Then you really expect us to make this our home, as heretofore, every summer?" she said.