o him when he was in London. He begs me to use
my influence to induce you to abandon your present ideas, and to make
you return to your old home at the Vicarage. I don't in the least agree
with your uncle, my dear. Wild as I believe your plans to be--you have
not the slightest chance of succeeding in carrying them out--I admire
your courage, your fidelity, your unshaken faith in my unhappy son,
after his unpardonable behavior to you. You are a fine creature,
Valeria, and I have come here to tell you so in plain words. Give me a
kiss, child. You deserve to be the wife of a hero, and you have married
one of the weakest of living mortals. God forgive me for speaking so of
my own son; but it's in my mind, and it must come out!"

This way of speaking of Eustace was more than I could suffer, even from
his mother. I recovered the use of my tongue in my husband's defense.

"I am sincerely proud of your good opinion, dear Mrs. Macallan," I said.
"But you distress me--forgive me if I own it plainly--when I hear you
speak so disparagingly of Eustace. I cannot agree with you that my
husband is the weakest of living mortals."

"Of course not!" retorted the old lady. "You are like all good
women--you make a hero of the man you love,--whether he deserve it or
not. Your husband has hosts of good qualities, child--and perhaps I know
them better than you do. But his whole conduct, from the moment when he
first entered your uncle's house to the present time, has been, I say
again, the conduct of an essentially weak man. What do you think he has
done now by way of climax? He has joined a charitable brotherhood; and
he is off to the war in Spain with a red cross on his arm, when he ought
to be here on his knees, asking his wife to forgive him. I say that is
the conduct of a weak man. Some people might call it by a harder name."

This news startled and distressed me. I might be resigned to his leaving
me for a time; but all my instincts as a woman revolted at his placing
himself in a position of danger during his separation from his wife.
He had now deliberately added to my anxieties. I thought it cruel of
him--but I would not confess what I thought to his mother. I affected
to be as cool as she was; and I disputed her conclusions with all the
firmness that I could summon to help me. The terrible old woman only
went on abusing him more vehemently than ever.

"What I complain of in my son," proceeded Mrs. Macallan, "is that he has
entirel