ut failed. And Keith was
allowed to stay up quite late, and when he was in bed at last, and
almost asleep, he thought he saw his father in the big easy chair by the
window, with the mother seated on his lap kissing him. And just as he
was dropping off, he heard, as if in a dream, his father's voice saying:

"Look out! I think the Crown Prince is still awake!"

VI

Some persons said that Keith looked like his father, others that he was
the very image of his mother.

"He has my light hair and Carl's brown eyes," said his mother often when
that topic was under discussion, and saying it seemed to make her happy.

"As a baby he was so pretty that people would stop us on the street to
ask whose child he was," Granny might put in, if she happened to be
within hearing. Then she would add with a glance at Keith: "But that is
all gone now."

Keith himself never gave much thought to his looks, but any comparison
with his mother struck him as quite foolish.

He liked to look at her, especially at her hair, which was very
plentiful and in colour like beaten copper with glints of gold in it.
Her skin was very fair and soft as the softest velvet. Her eyes were
blue, and in bright moments they had the softness of the sky of a
Swedish summer night. But when the clouds of depression closed in upon
her, they grew pale and light less and disturbingly furtive, so that
Keith's glance found it hard to meet them.

Her gaiety sparkled when she was herself, and she had a passionate love
of everything that was bright and pleasant. Once she had always been
that way and at times she would tell Keith what a wonderful time she had
as a girl, and how she used to be the centre and inspiration of every
social gathering in which she took part. She had a quick mind, too, and
a heart full of impulsive generosity. But from one extreme she would go
to another, so that, when the dark moments came, she would even regret
kindnesses conferred while the sun was still shining. In such moments
she would sometimes speak to the boy of her ailment as if he were in
some mysterious way responsible for it.

Yet she loved the boy to distraction and became filled with unreasoning
anxiety the moment he was out of sight. Her attitude toward her husband
was the same. He could never leave the home or return to it without
being kissed. The moment he was outside the kitchen door, she hastened
to the window and leaned out of it so that she might watch him until he