"Myron," said Homer hastily, "any time you want a friend for anything, come to me, will you?"
"Yes," she said simply, looking at him with ineffable gratitude and wonder in her eyes. "But have you forgotten——"
"My memory's as good as most folks' is," said Homer gruffly; then, wishing once for all to let her see he accepted the facts of her life, he said: "What do you call your child, Myron?"
"My," she answered, with the indescribable mother-voice of love, "little My."
"A very good name, too," said Homer, with conviction. "I'm coming in to see him some day."
Myron fairly gasped in terror.
"Oh, no," she said, with entreaty in her tones and eyes; "oh, no, promise you won't think of such a thing—promise you won't"—he was drawing up the horses at the Deans' gate, and she clasped both hands over his arm in her urgency. "Promise," she urged. He looked down at her, his face sombre; he gathered the beauty of her face and pleading eyes, his old self awakened for an instant from its bath of bitterness, and his old natural smile made his stern face bright and gentle as he said:
"Of course, I won't, if you don't want me to. Is it your grandmother?"
"Yes, and——" she unclasped her hands and began to descend. "Thank you so much," she said.
"For not coming?" he asked. His face was dark again.