"I’m your mother, Bob. It’s all summed up in that. Whatever makes for my children’s happiness makes for mine. Your father is not a woman, and that’s the difference between us. And now I’ve had all this trouble with him over Edith’s engagement; but he’s given in at last." Bob sprang away from her. "Edith engaged? Who to? Not to Ayling?" She took his arm again, continuing toward the Point. "Yes, to Ernest. He was so opposed to it. But I’ve battled for my child’s heart, Bob, and I’ve won out. Your father is giving her ten thousand a year. It isn’t much, but they ought to be able to manage. We didn’t write you, partly because it was only settled last week, and it was easier to wait and tell you." "But I thought you didn’t like the match yourself, old girl." "Oh, me! I have to turn myself every way at once. I’ve no wishes of my own. To reconcile my children to their father and their father to my children is all I live and work for." Coming to the little rustic gazebo perched on the tip of the Point, they entered and sat down. There being nothing to obtrude itself here on lake and moon and mountain, it was as if they had left human crudities behind. In the windless air, the fragrance of Bob’s cigarette mingled with the aromatic pungency of millions and millions of growing things. "There was simply nothing else to be done," Junia resumed. "There was Edith eating her heart out and stubborn as a mule—and with the mess you’ve made of things—not that you could _foresee_—or know the sort of people you were getting in among—" It was the opening he had been looking for, and he knew that, whatever the outcome, he must use it. "Exactly what do you mean by that, mother?" She seemed confused. "I don’t suppose I mean anything—except what’s obvious." Not to press the point at once, he said, "You saw Jennie." "Yes; I sent for her." "What did you think of her?" "Oh, what anyone would think. She’s charming—to look at." "Only to look at?" "Her manner is charming, too. Of course! I—I don’t quite know what you want me to say." "How much did she tell you that afternoon?" She looked at him through the moonlight. "Hasn’t she told _you_?" "She’s told me nothing—except that you were lovely." "Then, Bob dear, I’m afraid I can’t add anything. You see, they were _her_ secrets—" "Oh! Then she told you secrets!" "Why, of course! What did you think?" "Any other secret besides that she and I had been married?" "Bob darling, I don’t think it’s fair to put me on the witness stand. She’s your wife—and because she’s your wife I accept her. What I know is buried here"—she smote her chest—"and if for your sake and hers I try to forget it I think you might let me." For a few minutes he smoked in a silence broken only by the maniac cry of a loon in the distance. "Did it occur to you," he asked at last, "that she was a very simple girl who could easily become entangled in her talk when she tried to explain things to a woman of the world?"