"I'm glad," he replied, "if you are not disappointed in her. We have been very close—comrades and friends; but she has gone beyond me; and that was inevitable. She's an independent spirit—quite capable of managing her own affairs."
"I don't think she will ever go beyond you," Lois answered. "She has told me all the story—and I have read a good deal into it that she didn't tell me. And I am very grateful. She didn't have to tell me that you had not embittered her against me; her way of meeting me was reassuring as to that. It was fine of you; it wasn't what I expected or deserved."
Unconsciously they had begun walking back and forth in the path, and once, as they turned, they looked at each other fixedly for the first time. It was the deliberate frank scrutiny of old acquaintances who seek affirmation of fading memories after long absence.
"As to the money, I want to protect her, as far as money can do it, from hardship and need hereafter. I don't want you to think I offer it as restitution—or—penance. I have plenty for myself; I'm giving up nothing in doing it."
He tried to phrase carefully his disavowal of any thought that her gift was a penitential act. He confessed that he had been concerned for Phil's future; and that so far he had not been able to provide for her in case of his death. This brought him to Amzi, whose devotion to Phil he praised warmly. They met immediately upon the safe ground of Amzi's nobility. Then they recurred to Phil. Presently as they passed the veranda, she sat down on the steps and after a moment he seated himself beside her. They had sat thus, looking out upon the newly planned garden, when the mystery and wonder of Phil's coming filled their hearts and minds.
"I've thought," she said, bending forward with her arms folded upon her knees, "that Phil ought to travel—that I might take her away for a little while." She waited for his assent; but when he was silent, she hurried on to set herself right in this. "But I don't believe that would be best. Not with me. Trotting around with me over there wouldn't do her any good. It might spoil her point of view, which is—just right—sound and healthy. The child's a genius. She wants to write—of course you know that."
He did not know it. Jealousy pricked him at this sudden revelation of something in Phil that he had not with all his opportunity realized.
"She's very clever," he responded tamely.
"It's more than that! She has a trunkful of stuff she's written—some of it rubbish; some of it amazingly good."
He resented these appraisements of Phil's literary experiments. It was disagreeable to hear from Phil's mother things which he should have learned for himself. His trained analytical faculties were disturbed; he had regarded the theory of the superior keenness of maternal perception as rather fantastic. Phil had never confided her ambitions to him; in fact, it was now clear that she had concealed them, perhaps fearing his criticisms.