How she laughed! He just had to loosen up a little, and smile back, even though it looked pretty stiff.
"Well, I'll not tax you so far," he said. "I only want Mr. Stanton."
"But he is the whole of the kingdom, and the King to boot!" she laughed, dimpled, and flamed redder.
Mr. Pryor stared at her wonderingly. You could even see the wonder, like it was something you could take hold of. I suppose he wondered what could make a woman so happy, like that.
"Lucky man!" he said. "All of us are not so fortunate."
"Then it must be you don't covet the place or the title," said mother more soberly. "Any woman will crown the man she marries, if he will allow her. Paul went farther. He compelled it."
"I wonder how!" said Mr. Pryor, his eyes steadily watching mother's face.
"By never failing in a million little things, that taken as a whole, make up one mighty big thing, on which he stands like the Rock of Ages."
"Yet they tell me that you are the mother of twelve children," he said, as if he marvelled at something.
"Yes!" cried mother, and the word broke right through a bubbling laugh. "Am I not fortunate above most women? We had the grief to lose two little daughters at the ages of eight and nine, all the others I have, and I rejoice in them."