"You don't know that Emily married against her father's and my will; that she refused our help, and went off with her husband to share his lot. Oh, she was a proud one!" Madam Van Ruypen crushed her gloves together so tightly that the long hands within must have suffered. There was a pause, and Mr. King turned off to play with the paper-cutter again.
"And despite all our efforts, and, after Mr. Van Ruypen died, my individual attempts, we never could get any communication with her or her husband. Mr. King, I never blamed her; it was the influence of the man she married." She faced him now with blazing eyes and head erect.
Mr. King laid down the paper-cutter and turned back sympathetically; albeit several friends in the old town had kept alive for Emily Hastings's memory much commendation that she did not yield to her parents' choice of the superannuated wealthy foreigner they had selected as a husband for her.
"And he never let me know when the end was coming;" her voice did not break—she was to keep herself in hand until through. "Word was sent only after she had gone from this earth. Mr. King, who is that Pip you have with you?"
The transition was so sudden that the old gentleman started nearly out of his chair, stared at her, and gasped, "Pip—my dear Madam—"
"Tell me." He could see she was suffering now. The little beads of moisture ran down below the white puffs, and her eyes were fairly hungry for the reply.
"Pip—why, Pip—" stammered Mr. King.
"Tell me," she commanded peremptorily, "his name."
"It's—let me see, we have called him Pip constantly—" he groped for the rest of the recital Jasper had given him one day concerning the lad so thrown upon their sympathy. "I shall think of it presently,—or I can ask Jasper, or Ben," starting out of his chair.
"Stay," she laid a detaining hand upon his arm; "where did he live?"