There was a cynical smile on her lips, and she made an elaborate bow to her daughter.
"Oh, mamma, I beg your pardon!" exclaimed the girl, almost frightened. "I truly beg your pardon! If—you—I—"
Her mother looked steadily out of the window. Then she said, slowly, "How did you come to find all this out before you were married, child? Have I not done a mother's duty by you in keeping you in ignorance, so far as I could, of all the struggles and facts of life—of—"
The bitter tone was in her voice again. Gertrude was hurt by it, it was so full of self-reproach mingled with self-contempt. She slipped her arm about her mother's waist.
"Don't, mamma," she said. "Don't blame yourself like that. I'm sure you have always done the best possible—the—"
Her mother laughed, but the note was not pleasant.
"Yes, I always did the lady-like thing,—nothing. I floated with the tide. Take my advice, daughter,—float. If you don't, you'll only tire yourself trying to swim against a tide that is too strong for you and—and nothing will come of it. Nothing at all." The girl began to protest with the self-confidence of youth, but her mother went on. She had taken the bit in her teeth to-day and meant to run the whole race.
"Do you suppose I did not know about the Spillini family? About the thousands of Spillini families? Do you suppose I did not know that the rent of ten such families—their whole earnings for a year—would be spent on—on a pretty inlaid prayer-book like this?" She tapped the jeweled cross and turned it over on her lap. The girl's eyes were wide and almost fear-filled as she studied her handsome care-free mother in her new mood.
"Did you really suppose I did not know that this gem on the top of the cross is dyed with the life-blood of some poor wretch, and that this one represents the price of the honor of a starving girl?" She shivered, and the girl drew back. "Did you fancy me as ignorant and as—happy—as I have talked? Don't you know that it is the sole duty of a well-bred woman to be ignorant—and happy? Otherwise she is morbid!" She pronounced the word affectedly, and then laughed a bitter little laugh.
"Don't, mamma," said the girl, again. "I quite understand now, quite—" She laid her head on her mother's bosom and was silent. Presently she felt a tear drop on her hair. She put her hand up to her mother's cheek and stroked it.