"What is it?" he repeated fiercely, "why he refuses to have anything to do with the business I have bought for him, and declares he must start at once for the Radiant City. Radiant City, indeed! Why everyone knows that the herald is no true prophet; there is no such place. Belief in it has long ago vanished."
"It is only a passing fancy of the boy's," said his wife, "he said something to me about it last night, but I made little of it, and told him to get rid of the nonsense as soon as he could. He won't be driven, Anthony; we can only persuade him. It has been so with him ever since he was a child; the boy will not be talked out of it."
"Aye, he was always a stubborn lad and went his own way; but this is passing all bounds, after the trouble I have taken to set him up in life, and with the prospect of making a large fortune."
"Has he scruples about the business, then?"
"Scruples? He says he will have nothing to do with it; that he would be getting rich at the expense of other men's souls, or some such nonsense. Besides which he is starting out at once for the Radiant City."
"He won't do that," said his wife, smiling, "he won't leave Gabrielle, and certainly Gabrielle is not one to go on that mad journey with him. She is too fond of Punon. Do not fear, Anthony. The boy is devoted heart and soul to Gabrielle, and nothing would induce him to give her up."
"Mark my word, she will go with him. A woman is easily persuaded by the man she loves."
"Gabrielle is much too fond of her comforts and luxuries to give them up even for Amer. She loves herself better than him; I have noticed this in a hundred ways. No, she will never start on that long and hazardous journey, and if the boy does he will have to go without her. It will be hard for him, poor lad, if he keeps to his resolution, but he won't."
Half comforted, her husband rose up, determined to seek his son once more and to bring before him all the strongest arguments he could think of to turn his mind before it was too late.
His wife let her work drop on to her knee after he had left the room, and her eyes peered out into the twilight with a somewhat mournful expression in them.