‘Papa! of course! What would home be without your father?’
I had found it much pleasanter without him than with him hitherto, but some instinct made me hold my tongue.
‘Don’t you love papa, dear?’ the lady went on softly. ‘Don’t you think that he loves you?’
‘I don’t know,’ I said, picking my fingers.
‘Poor child! Perhaps you have thought not, but that will all be altered now. But you have not yet told me if you will like to have me for a mother!’
‘I think I shall like you very much!’
‘That’s right, so we will go home together and try to make each other happy. You want a mother to look after you, dear child, and I want a little boy to love me. We will not part again, Charlie, now I have found you, not for the present, at all events. You have been too long away from home as it is. That is why I came to-day. I could not wait till to-morrow, even: I was so impatient to see you and to take you home.’
How she dwelt and lingered on the word and repeated it, as though it gave her as much happiness to listen to as it did me.
‘Will you be there?’ I asked, presently.
‘Of course, I shall—always! What would be the use of a mother, Charlie, if she didn’t live in the house close to you, always ready to heal your troubles and supply your wants to the utmost of her power?’