Her son did not reply to her, but there was no sign of regret on his face, no word of apology on his tongue. He had found the fruit sweet, and not bitter,—he had plucked it in defiance of her well-known wishes. She had lost the little boy that she had led by the hand for years,—the young man that had lingered by her side, apparently indifferent to all feminine society but her own. She had lost him for ever, and, making a motion of her plump hands as if she were washing him and his affairs from them, she got up and moved toward the door.
"Don't you want to hear about my journey?" he asked, kindly.
She did indeed want to hear. She was suffering from a burning inquisitiveness, yet she affected indifference, and said, coldly, "I do, if you will tell me the truth."
"Did I ever tell you a lie?"
"No, but I daresay you will begin now,—'by their fruits ye shall know them.' I thought you were never going to get married."
"I never said so."
"You acted it."
"You had better sit down, and I will tell you how it happened," he said, soothingly.
Mrs. Prymmer hesitated, then, dominated by his slightly imperious manner and her own ungovernable curiosity, she took on the air of a suffering martyr, and reseated herself.
There was a large mirror over the mantelpiece, and the young man, catching in it a glimpse of the contrast between his own pale face and the ruddy one of his mother, murmured, "You are very fresh-looking for fifty-five years."