er bait him, she opened her arms. He sprang into them. At once
his sobs turned to sighs of infinite relief, which continued, until, of
a sudden, he was hugged so tight that he had no breath left but to gasp.

"And you will always be with me?" he asked.

"It is the way of the world," she answered, while she kissed him, "that
sons chooses for themselves."

With that he was quite content....

For a long time they sat silent at the window. The boy dreamed
hopefully of the times to come--serenity restored. For the moment the
woman was forgetful of the foreshadowed days, happy that the warm,
pulsing little body of her son lay unshrinking in her arms: so
conscious of his love and life--so wishful for a deeper sense of
motherhood--that she slipped her hand under his jacket and felt about
for his heart, and there let her fingers lie, within touch of its
steady beating. The lights still twinkled and flashed and aimlessly
wandered in the night; but the spell of the river was lifted.

[Illustration: Headpiece to _A Garden of Lies_]

_A GARDEN OF LIES_

Withal it was a rare mood: nor, being wise, was she given to expressing
it in this gloomy fashion. It was her habit, rather, assiduously to
woo him: this with kisses, soft and wet; with fleeting touches; with
coquettish glances and the sly display of her charms; with rambling,
fantastic tales of her desirability in the regard of men--thus
practicing all the familiar fascinations of her kind, according to the
enlightenment of the world she knew. He must be persuaded, she
thought, that his mother was beautiful, coveted; convinced of her wit
and gaiety: else he would not love her. Life had taught her no other
way.... And always at break of day, when he awoke in her arms, she
waited, with a pang of anxiety, pitilessly recurring, lest there be
some sign that despite her feverish precautions the heedless world had
in her nightly absence revealed that which she desperately sought to
hide from him....

Thus, by and by, when the lamp was alight--when the shadows were all
chased out of the window, driven back to the raw fall night, whence
they had crept in--she lapsed abruptly into her natural manner and
practices. She spread a newspaper on the table, whistling in a cheery
fashion, the while covertly observing the effect of this lively
behaviour. With a knowing smile, promising vast gratification, she got
him on her knee; and together, cheek to cheek, her ar