The man was so lost to external things he did not notice the change in his mother's face. He was deliberately rehearsing aloud his plan of campaign, and counting his forces and chances. He had almost forgotten he addressed his mother. He knew he might speak out with safety. This was the first time he had dared to give utterance to his thoughts in the presence of another. There was intoxication in the fearless recital of his case, and, with his bodily eyes indifferent to things around him, he abandoned himself to the delight of speaking his secret thought, and observing how the uttered words lightened his burden. "You are curious to know her name?" he asked, in a mechanical tone. "I should like to hear who it is," she returned. "It's a very good name. It will bring no discredit on the name of Grey. Guess." "Indeed, I cannot." "Maud Midharst." "Maud Midharst!" exclaimed the old woman, relaxing the rigidity of her pose, and falling for support against the back of her chair--"Maud Midharst!" she repeated, in a tone of dismay. For a moment she had forgotten she was listening to a man suffering from severe mental disturbance. Instantly almost she recovered herself, and fixing eyes now full of tenderness and pity upon her son, resumed her upright attitude, and continued her former plan of humouring him. "She is very beautiful, very amiable, and very rich," the woman said. "She is very beautiful, very amiable, and _very poor_," he said impressively. Again Mrs. Grey started. His tones were not those of a man of unsound mind; and although his face looked pale and worn, and there was a queer expression in the eyes, the whole conveyed the idea of a man overwrought rather than radically unsound of head. She was so much thrown off her guard that she could not refrain from repeating aloud, "Very poor!" "Yes, very poor," he went on in the same monotonous voice, and with the same lightless face turned to hers. "And it is because she is very poor I am going to marry her." "A regular love romance!" cried the old lady in a sprightly voice. The tears were in her eyes. Her son, her only son, the idol of her life, breaking down thus in his strong manhood! Hard sight for a mother! How hard to sit still, and seem calm, and watch the light of departing reason flickering in those large blue eyes, which in the happy warm long ago had looked up to hers as the baby boy lay at her breast. "A real _business_ romance," he said gravely. "A real business romance." "It must be a romance indeed if you are marrying her because she is poor, for I believe you, Henry, are not rich." She thought, "Perhaps it will be best to take an interest in all this. If I do not he may think I suspect him of being under delusions, and I daresay that would make him worse."