"It appears to be the nature of mothers," said John, indulgently. "But you will allow me to hope for Peter's happiness, and quite incidentally, of course, for our own?"
She smiled. "Seriously, John, I wish you would tell me how he got on in London."
"He dined with me once or twice, as you know," said John, "and was very friendly. I think he was relieved that I made no suggestion of tutors or universities, and that I took his eyeglass for granted. In short, that I treated him as I should treat any other young man of my acquaintance; whereas he had greatly feared I might presume upon my guardianship to give him good advice. But I did not, because he is too young to want advice just now, and prefers, like most of us, to buy his own experience."
"I hope he was really nice to you. You won't hide anything? You'll tell me exactly?"
"I am hiding nothing. The lad is a good lad at bottom, and a manly one into the bargain," said John. "His defects are of the kind which get up, so to speak, and hit you in the eye; and are, consequently, not of a kind to escape observation. What is obviously wrong is easiest cured. He has yet to learn that 'manners maketh man,' but he was learning it as fast as possible. The mistakes of youth are rather pathetic than annoying."
"Sometimes," said Lady Mary.
"He fell, very naturally, into most of the conventional errors which beset the inexperienced Londoner," said John, smiling slightly at the recollection. "He talked in a familiar manner of persons whose names were unknown to him the day before yesterday; and told well-known anecdotes about well-known people whom he hadn't had time to meet, as though they had only just happened. The kind of stories outsiders tell to new-comers. And he professed to be bored at every party he attended. I won't say that the habitué is always too well bred, or too grateful to his entertainers, to do anything of the kind; but he is certainly too wise or too cautious."
"Perhaps he was bored?" said Lady Mary, wistfully. "Knowing nobody, poor boy."
"The first time I met him on neutral ground was at a dance," said John. "He looked very tall and nervous and lonely, and, of course, he was not dancing; but, nevertheless, he was the hero of the evening, or so Miss Sarah gave me to understand. But you can imagine it for yourself. The war just over, and a young fellow who has lost so much in it; the gallant nephew of the gallant Ferries; besides his own romantic name, and his eligibility. I took him off to the National Gallery, to make acquaintance with the portrait of our cavalier ancestor there; and I declare there is a likeness. Miss Sarah had visited it long ago, it appears. For my part, I am glad to think that these fashionable young women can still be so enthusiastic about a wounded soldier. Sarah said they were all wild to dance with him, and ready to shed tears for his lost arm."
"And was he much with Sarah?"