"Your loving son,
"GORDON.
"P.S.—Your future daughter-in-law is just crazy to be taken into your motherly fold.
"G."
Mr. Harker's face was wreathed in smiles at the thought of the pleasant news it was his good fortune to be conveying to the wife of his chief. His smile remained until he heard the trim maid's announcement at the door of Mrs. Carbhoy's boudoir. Then the smile vanished, as though it had never been, and his well-nourished features became an assortment of troubled bewilderment. Furthermore, within five minutes of his ushering into the lady's presence he had registered a solemn vow that celibacy should remain his lot, until the day that saw his ample remains become a subject for cooking operations by the crematorium experts.
Mr. Harker was certainly unfortunate in his selection of the moment at which to pay his call. Mrs. James Carbhoy had had half an hour since reading her son's letter, in which to pursue that hateful hyphenated word "daughter-in-law" through every darkened channel of her somewhat limited mental machinery.
Daughter-in-law! It was everywhere. She could not lose sight of it. She could not escape its haunting meaning. It pursued her wherever she went. It was there, lurking amidst the folds of her gowns if she peered inside the great hanging wardrobes. It danced like a will-o'-the-wisp in every mirror which her troubled eyes chanced to encounter. It was interwoven with the patterns of the carpets; and the wall-paperings found a lurking-place for it amidst the unreal foliage which adorned them. It laughed at her when she angrily turned away to avoid it, and when she endeavored to defy it its mocking only increased. So it was that the unoffending Harker encountered the full tide of her angry alarm and maternal despair.
Mr. Harker had prepared a well-turned opening for his excellent news. But it was never used. Even as his lips moved to speak they remained sealed, held silent by the bitter cry of outraged maternal pride.
"He's married!" she cried. "Married—and I—I have never been consulted!"
Mr. Harker felt as though he had been caught up in the whirl of a physical encounter in which his opponent held all the advantage.
Mrs. Carbhoy waited for no comment. She rushed headlong, following up her advantage, smashing in "lefts" and "rights" indiscriminately.