But Mrs. Travers's words had sunk in deeper than that good lady herself had hoped for; and one evening, when Abner Herrick was seated at his desk penning a scathing indictment of the President for lack of firmness and decision on the tariff question, Ann, putting her thin arms round his neck and rubbing her little sallow face against his right-hand whisker, took him to task on the subject. "You're not bringing me up properly--not as you ought to," explained Ann. "You give way to me too much, and you never scold me." "Not scold you!" exclaimed Abner with a certain warmth of indignation. "Why, I'm doing it all--" "Not what _I_ call scolding," continued Ann. "It's very wrong of you. I shall grow up horrid if you don't help me." As Ann with great clearness pointed out to him, there was no one else to undertake the job with any chance of success. If Abner failed her, then she supposed there was no hope for her: she would end by becoming a wicked woman, and everybody, including herself, would hate her. It was a sad prospect. The contemplation of it brought tears to Ann's eyes. He saw the justice of her complaint and promised to turn over a new leaf. He honestly meant to do so; but, like many another repentant sinner, found himself feeble before the difficulties of performance. He might have succeeded better had it not been for her soft deep eyes beneath her level brows. "You're not much like your mother," so he explained to her one day, "except about the eyes. Looking into your eyes I can almost see your mother." He was smoking a pipe beside the fire, and Ann, who ought to have been in bed, had perched herself upon one of the arms of his chair and was kicking a hole in the worn leather with her little heels. "She was very beautiful, my mother, wasn't she?" suggested Ann. Abner Herrick blew a cloud from his pipe and watched carefully the curling smoke. "In a way, yes," he answered. "Quite beautiful." "What do you mean, 'In a way'?" demanded Ann with some asperity. "It was a spiritual beauty, your mother's," Abner explained. "The soul looking out of her eyes. I don't think it possible to imagine a more beautiful disposition than your mother's. Whenever I think of your mother," continued Abner after a pause, "Wordsworth's lines always come into my mind." He murmured the quotation to himself, but loud enough to be heard by sharp ears. Miss Kavanagh was mollified. "You were in love with my mother, weren't you?" she questioned him kindly. "Yes, I suppose I was," mused Abner, still with his gaze upon the curling smoke. "What do you mean by 'you suppose you were'?" snapped Ann. "Didn't you know?" The tone recalled him from his dreams. "I was in love with your mother very much," he corrected himself, turning to her with a smile. "Then why didn't you marry her?" asked Ann. "Wouldn't she have you?" "I never asked her," explained Abner. "Why not?" persisted Ann, returning to asperity. He thought a moment.