"So kind of your Uncle James," she said, as she did so, watching meantime, with puzzled uneasiness, Honor's listless fingering of the jewel-case.
"Very kind!" remarked the girl, tilting her chin somewhat superciliously. "Am I not marrying a rich man? If Ronald had been poor, how would Uncle James have treated me?"
"Honor, Honor," said her mother, a pained look crossing her face, "how very unlike you to be so bitter."
Honor crossed over to where her mother sat and dropped down on the rug beside her, and taking one of her mother's hands pressed it to her cheek.
"He thinks it really, little mother, only you are too good to see it, and know too that I love Ronald so dearly that I'd marry him if he hadn't a second coat to put on. Uncle James, of all people!"—she threw the case into the chair she had just vacated, her blue eyes shining and hard—"Uncle James, who might have done so much, who might have saved his nephew from destruction by holding out a helping hand. Poor Jim!"
Her clear voice broke for a moment, then she pointed to a table in the corner that was covered with wedding presents.
"I'd give them all for one little note from Jim saying he was sorry and was coming to us. Just imagine if he came home and sat with us here in this very room! I cannot get him out of my thoughts to-night. Perhaps, somewhere, he is thinking of us."
Mrs. Latimer sank back in her chair, the tears coursing down her face.
"I pray night and morning that he may come back to us, and it seems as though God turned a deaf ear to all my pleadings. I dream of him, Honor, so often, our handsome boy, as he was before he went astray, and the awakening seems more than I can bear."
A pang shot through Honor's heart as she looked up into the fragile face, and she regretted having been carried away to speak of the prodigal.