“But what did you think of yourself, Mr. Bolling, for your eavesdropping?” “Thought I was doing my duty by my sister, to circumvent a gay deceiver!” Mark frowned. “Oh, now you don’t know how old pill-box and blister-plaster could court! You should have heard him talk about that ‘regal brow’—‘that, _that_ face!’ (as if there was no word good enough to describe it)—and ‘those holy eyes’—and ‘my darling, _oh_, my darling’—and ‘my lovely Helen’—and ‘it is too much, _too_ much to crave of Heaven’ (her love you know he meant)—and ‘oh, my dearest’—and ‘this little hand’—and all the rest of the lying balderdash, which I suppose was mighty sweet to a woman who had not heard such words for twenty years.” “And how do you know it was not perfectly sincere?” exclaimed Mark, indignantly rising and walking away. “What, at forty?” coolly inquired Uncle Billy, getting up and walking about, and fanning himself, and sitting down again. But Mr. Sutherland was much too deeply interested in his mother’s fate to keep silence. He returned, and resumed his seat, and inquired— “Has my mother’s marriage turned out happy?” “Don’t know—can’t say, I’m sure!” “You have not told me yet why she sold her home.” “Dr. Wells tempted her to do it for his sake. This was the way of it: Lord bless your soul, he was too old and cunning to stop courting her after the honeymoon, or at least until he had got his hands on the property; on the contrary, they sat on the bench of the piazza against the parlour window blinds, and _courted_ more than ever! And I laid on the lounge under the same window in the parlour, and _listened_ more than ever. And then he cooed to her, and called her ‘My boon,’ ‘My blessing,’ and ‘My bride;’ and told her what a noble woman she was—how full of sensibility, benevolence, and disinterestedness—how full of honour, truth, and courage.” “Well, sir, it was truth! I can easily understand how much truth should have burst impulsively from the lips of any one intimately associated with my dear mother!” exclaimed Mark, impatiently. Uncle Billy shut his eyes, and bobbed up his chin contemptuously, and then resumed: