There was something conclusive in Anderson's voice which reassured Charlotte.
“My son would not say so unless he thought so,” said Mrs. Anderson. “He never says a thing he does not mean.” She spoke with a double meaning which Charlotte wholly missed. It had not occurred to her that Mr. Anderson would have taken her in his arms last night and kissed her and comforted her, if he had not been thoroughly in earnest and in love with her. She supposed, of course, he wished to marry her. All that troubled her was her own course in practically proposing to him. Presently, after she and Mrs. Anderson were alone together, she tried to say something about this to the other woman.
“I don't know as I ought to have come here last night,” she said, “but—”
“Where else would you have gone?” inquired Mrs. Anderson.
Charlotte looked up at her piteously. “I hope Mr. Anderson didn't think I—I—ought not to,” she whispered, and she felt her cheeks blazing with shame. She did not know if Mrs. Anderson really knew, but she was as much ashamed.
Mrs. Anderson stooped over her and laid her soft old cheek against the soft young one. “My precious child!” she whispered. “I could not help seeing last night, and this was just the place for you to come, for this is your home, or is going to be; isn't it, dear?”
Charlotte put up her soft little arms around the other woman's neck, and began to cry softly. “Oh,” she sobbed, “I don't want him to think that I—”
“Hush, dear! He will think nothing he ought not to think,” said Mrs. Anderson, who did not, in reality, know in the least what the girl was troubled about, but rather thought it possible that she might fear lest her son was not in earnest in his attentions, on her father's account. She did not imagine Charlotte's faith and pride in her father. “My son cares a great deal for you, dear child, or he would never have done as he did last night,” she said, “and some day we are all going to be very happy.”
Charlotte continued to sob softly, but not altogether unhappily.
“My son will make a very good husband,” Mrs. Anderson said, with a slight inflection of pride. “He will make a good husband, just as his father did.”