“What I complain of in my son,” proceeded Mrs. Macallan, “is that he has entirely failed to understand you. If he had married a fool, his conduct would be intelligible enough. He would have done wisely to conceal from a fool that he had been married already, and that he had suffered the horrid public exposure of a Trial for the murder of his wife. Then, again, he would have been quite right, when this same fool had discovered the truth, to take himself out of her way before she could suspect him of poisoning her—for the sake of the peace and quiet of both parties. But you are not a fool. I can see that, after only a short experience of you. Why can’t he see it too? Why didn’t he trust you with his secret from the first, instead of stealing his way into your affections under an assumed name? Why did he plan (as he confessed to me) to take you away to the Mediterranean, and to keep you abroad, for fear of some officious friends at home betraying him to you as the prisoner of the famous Trial? What is the plain answer to all these questions? What is the one possible explanation of this otherwise unaccountable conduct? There is only one answer, and one explanation. My poor, wretched son—he takes after his father; he isn’t the least like me!—is weak: weak in his way of judging, weak in his way of acting, and, like all weak people, headstrong and unreasonable to the last degree. There is the truth! Don’t get red and angry. I am as fond of him as you are. I can see his merits too. And one of them is that he has married a woman of spirit and resolution—so faithful and so fond of him that she won’t even let his own mother tell her of his faults. Good child! I like you for hating me!”
“Dear madam, don’t say that I hate you!” I exclaimed (feeling very much as if I did hate her, though, for all that). “I only presume to think that you are confusing a delicate-minded man with a weak-minded man. Our dear unhappy Eustace—”
“Is a delicate-minded man,” said the impenetrable Mrs. Macallan, finishing my sentence for me. “We will leave it there, my dear, and get on to another subject. I wonder whether we shall disagree about that too?”
“What is the subject, madam?”
“I won’t tell you if you call me madam. Call me mother. Say, ‘What is the subject, mother?’”
“What is the subject, mother?”
“Your notion of turning yourself into a Court of Appeal for a new Trial of Eustace, and forcing the world to pronounce a just verdict on him. Do you really mean to try it?”
“I do!”
Mrs. Macallan considered for a moment grimly with herself.
“You know how heartily I admire your courage, and your devotion to my unfortunate son,” she said. “You know by this time that I don’t cant. But I cannot see you attempt to perform impossibilities; I cannot let you uselessly risk your reputation and your happiness without warning you before it is too late. My child, the thing you have got it in your head to do is not to be done by you or by anybody. Give it up.”