Uncle Robert burst out laughing.
“Your mother is young enough to have another family yet!”
Philip got up and stamped about the floor, his hands deep in his trouser pockets, his masterful chin in the air.
“Young man,” said Uncle Robert, “you were born when your mother was about seventeen. She has devoted herself to you for twenty-five years. Let someone else have a show in.”
There is no knowing what Philip would have replied to this, for at the moment both Mrs. Barrimore and Dan appeared, so of necessity the subject dropped.
But Philip, albeit still angry with Colonel Lane, was very tender to his pretty mother, placing her chair for her, and embracing her with extra warmth.
She had refused to marry the Colonel, and he chose to show his approval.
But the pretty pink color was absent from her cheeks, and dark rims surrounded the grey eyes.
CHAPTER XI
A RAY OF HOPE
When Mrs. Le Breton kissed Eweretta, it had been for her dead child’s sake, the child she had loved with all the passion of her soul, but with that spontaneous action a flood of repentance had surged up within her. She recalled with what sweetness Eweretta had begged to share what she had with her half-sister. She remembered, too, how she had hated Eweretta for being in a position to patronize her poor, defrauded child—hated her for her health, her education, her mental vigor.