“I am blessed in my children,” Mrs. Holmes went on, happily. “I often wonder what I have done that I should have so perfect a boy as Willie for my very own. Everybody admires him so that I dwell in constant fear of kidnappers.”
“I wouldn’t worry,” said Dorothy, with ill-concealed sarcasm. “Anybody who took him would bring him back inside of two hours.”
“I try to think so,” returned the mother, with a deep sigh. “Willie’s indomitable will is my deepest comfort. He gets it from my side of the family. None of the children take after their father at all. Ebbie was a little like his father’s folks at first, but I soon got it out of him and made him altogether like my people. I do not think anybody could keep Willie away from me except by superior physical force. He absolutely adores his mother, as my other children do. You never saw such beautiful sentiment as they have. The other day, now, when I went away and left Rebbie alone in my apartment, she took down my best hat and put it on. The poor little thing wanted to be near her mother. Is it not touching?”
“It is indeed,” Dorothy assented, dryly.
“My children have never been punished,” continued Mrs. Holmes, now auspiciously launched upon her favourite theme. “It has never been necessary. I rule them entirely through love, and they are so accustomed to my methods that they bitterly resent any interference by outsiders. Why, just before we came here, Ebbie, young as he is, put out the left eye of a woman who tried to take his dog away from him. He did it with his little fist and with apparently no effort at all. Is it not wonderful to see such strength and power of direction in one so young? The woman was in the hospital when we came away, and I trust by this time, she has learned not to interfere with Ebbie. No one is allowed to interfere with my children.”
“Apparently not,” remarked Mrs. Carr, somewhat cynically.
“It is beautiful to be a mother—the most beautiful thing on earth! Just think how much I have done for the world!” Her sallow face glowed with the conscious virtue bestowed by one of the animal functions upon those who have performed it.
“In what way?” queried Mrs. Carr, wholly missing the point.
“Why, in raising Willie and Ebbie and Rebbie! No public service can for a moment be compared with that! All other things sink into insignificance beside the glorious gift of maternity. Look at Willie—a form that a sculptor might dream of for a lifetime and never hope to imitate—a head that already has inspired great artists! The gentleman who took Willie’s last tintype said that he had never seen such perfect lines, and insisted on taking several for fear something should happen to Willie. He wanted to keep some of them for himself—it was pathetic, the way he pleaded, but I made him sell me all of them. Willie is mine and I have the first right to his tintypes. And a lady once painted Willie at his play in black and white and sent it to one of the popular weeklies. I have no doubt they gave her a fortune for it, but it never occurred to her to give us anything more than one copy of the paper.”
“Which paper was it?”