Mrs Underwood shook her head. “My own family--that is, my boy,” she said. “So it is,” said Miss Anna. “Of course I don’t count; but you will have the satisfaction, my dear, if you should live to be a hundred, of feeling that you have saved your boy.” At this Mrs Underwood shook her head once more, and two tears came into her eyes. “He will be lost to me,” she said. “Oh, I remember well enough how I felt myself when I married Henry. ‘What does he want with his mother? he has got me,’ I used to say. I never liked him to go too often to the old lady. And now I am the old lady, and his wife will think the same of me.” “Let us hope she will be a better Christian than you were,” said Miss Anna, with a laugh. “A better Christian! I hope I have always been a Christian at heart, whatever else I may have failed in. I hope I have always remembered my duty to my Maker,” said Mrs Underwood, offended. This assault dried the tears in her eyes. “And, Anna, though I’m sure I am not one to find fault, I don’t think that you--never going to church, and reading French novels and things, and making schemes to keep your neighbours out of their rights----” Miss Anna laughed with genuine enjoyment. “I acknowledge all my sins, my dear,” she said. “I am not the person to talk, am I? But, never mind, perhaps there will be no need to hope that Mrs Geoff should be a better Christian than her mother-in-law. Perhaps there will be no Mrs Geoff. It may come to nothing after all.” “Oh, Anna, how cruel you are!” cried Mrs Underwood. “If it comes to nothing, what is to become of my boy?” “Anyhow, let us be thankful that you will get a good deal of misery out of it, which will be a satisfaction. Go and put on your bonnet--your best bonnet--and make yourself look nice; we all like you to look nice; and go off, my dear, upon your charitable mission,” Miss Anna cried.