Mrs. Thompson: A Novel

by W. B. Maxwell

Mr. Mears and the rest of the staff were more than satisfied. Perhaps they blessed the idolized Enid for an increasing capacity to absorb every energy and volition that Mrs. Thompson could spare from the shop.

Whatever Enid wished for her mother provided. She racked her brains in order to forestall the child's wishes. But the difficulty always was this, one could not be quite sure what Enid really wished. She accepted the pretty gifts, the conditions of her life, the plans for her future, with a calm unruffled acquiescence.

When Mrs. Thompson regretfully decided that it would be advisable to dismiss the expensive governesses and send the home pupil to an expensive school, Enid placidly and immediately agreed. Mrs. Thompson thought that school would open Enid's mind, that school would give her an opportunity of making nice girl-friends. Enid at once thought so, too.

"But, oh, my darling, what a gap there will be in this house! You'll leave a sore and a sad heart behind you. I shall miss you woefully."

"And I shall miss you, mamma."

Then, when Enid had gone to the fashionable seminary at Eastbourne, with the faithful Yates as escort, with a wonderful luncheon-basket of delicacies in the first-class reserved compartment, with several huge boxes of school trousseau in the luggage van, Mrs. Thompson began to suffer torment. Was it not cruel to send the brave little thing away from her? Might not her darling be now a prey to similar yearnings and longings for a swift reunion? The torment became agony; and after two days Mrs. Thompson rushed down to see for herself if the new scholar was all right.

Enid was entirely all right—playing with the other girls at the bottom of the secluded garden.

"Is that you, mummy?" This was a form of greeting peculiar to Enid from very early days. "I am so glad to see you," and she kissed mamma affectionately.

She was uniformly affectionate, whether at school or at home, but never explosive or demonstrative in the manifestations of her affection. There was more warmth in her letters than in her spoken words. "My own dearest mother," she used to write, "I am so looking forward to being with you again. Do meet me at the station." But when the train arrived and Mrs. Thompson, who had been pacing the Mallingbridge platform in a fever of expectation, clasped the beloved object to her heart, she experienced something akin to disappointment. It was a sedately composed young lady that offered a cool cheek to the mother's tremulous lips.