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Rh at any rate give you, and they shall see that there is no quarrel between us.'

But Lady Mason did not desire this. She would have wished that he might have been miles away from the court had that been possible. 'Mrs. Orme is to be with me,' she said.

Then again there came a black frown upon his brow,—a frown such as there had often been there of late. 'And will Mrs. Orme's presence make the attendance of your own son improper?'

'Oh, no; of course not. I did not mean that, Lucius.'

'Do you not like to have me near you?' he asked; and as he spoke he rose up, and took her hand as he stood before her.

She gazed for a moment into his face while the tears streamed down from her eyes, and then rising from her chair, she threw herself on to his bosom and clasped him in her arms. 'My boy! my boy!' she said. 'Oh, if you could be near me, and away from this—away from this!'

She had not intended thus to give way, but the temptation had been too strong for her. When she had seen Mrs. Orme and Peregrine together,—when she had heard Peregrine's mother, with words expressed in a joyful tone, affect to complain of the inroads which her son made upon her, she had envied her that joy. 'Oh, if it could be so with me also!' she always thought; and the words too had more than once been spoken. Now at last, in this last moment, as it might be, of her life at home, he had come to her with kindly voice, and she could not repress her yearning.

'Lucius,' she said; 'dearest Lucius! my own boy!' And then the tears from her eyes streamed hot on to his bosom.

'Mother,' he said, 'it shall be so. I will be with you.'

But she was now thinking of more than this—of much more. Was it possible for her to tell him now? As she held him in her arms, hiding her face upon his breast, she struggled hard to speak the word. Then in the midst of that struggle, while there was still something like a hope within her that it might be done, she raised her head and looked up into his face. It was not a face pleasant to look at, as was that of Peregrine Orme. It was hard in its outlines, and perhaps too manly for his age. But she was his mother, and she loved it well. She looked up at it, and raising her hands she stroked his cheeks. She then kissed him again and again, with warm, clinging kisses. She clung to him, holding him close to her, while the sobs which she had so long repressed came forth from her with a violence that terrified him. Then again she looked up into his face with one long wishful gaze; and after that she sank upon the sofa and hid her face within her hands. She had made the struggle, but it had been of no avail. She could not tell him that tale with her own voice.

'Mother,' he said, 'what does this mean? I cannot understand