“You did! And you meant Ludlum was a ‘nuisance’; not you. And I don’t think it’s very nice! Do you?” “Why, I nev——” But his cousin’s emotions were no longer to be controlled. She rose, trembling. “What a fool I was this afternoon!” she exclaimed bitterly. “I didn’t suspect you; yet I never remembered your being nervous in a thunder-storm before. I thought you were sympathetic, and all the time you were thinking these cruel, wicked things about Luddie and me!” Lucius rose, too. “You know what I think about you, all the time, Jennie,” he said genially. “John, if you can remember where you put my umbrella when we came in, it’s about time for me to be catching a street-car down to the station.” She opposed him with a passionate gesture. “No!” she cried fiercely. “You can’t say such things to me and then slip out like that! You tell me I’ve taught my child to be a coward and that I’ve made a spoilt brat of him——” “Jennie!” he protested. “I was talking about _me_!” “Shame on you to pretend!” she said. “You think I’m making John _hate_ Luddie——” “_Jennie!_” he shouted in genuine astonishment. “You do! And you come here pretending to be such a considerate, sympathetic friend—and every minute you’re criticizing and condemning me in your heart for all my little stories to my child—all because—because—” suddenly she uttered a dry sob—“because I want to raise my boy to be a—a poet!” “John,” said Lucius desperately, “_do_ you think you can find that umbrella?” With almost startling alacrity John rose and vanished from the room, and Lucius would have followed, but the distressed lady detained him. She caught a sagging pocket of his coat, and he found it necessary to remain until she should release him. “You sha’n’t!” she cried. “Not till you’ve taken back that accusation.” “But what accusa——” “Shame on you! Ah, I didn’t think you’d ever come here and do such a thing to me. And this morning I was looking forward to a happy day! It’s a good thing you’re a bachelor!” With which final insult she hurled his pocket from her—at least that was the expression of her gesture—and sank into a chair, weeping heart-brokenly. “You don’t understand!” she sobbed. “How could any man understand—or any woman not a mother! You think these hard things of me, but—but John doesn’t always love Luddie. Don’t you get even a little glimpse of what that means to me? There are times when John doesn’t even _like_ Luddie!” “Take care,” said Lucius gently. “Take care that those times don’t come oftener.” She gasped, and would have spoken, but for a moment she could not, and was able only to gaze at him fiercely through her tears. Yet there was a hint of fear behind the anger. “You dare to say such a thing as that to a mother?” she said, when she could speak.