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Rh little. He works entirely to please himself. And he is a comfort, to both of us. He is a strange child. He is not a child.”

“And what is he going to be?”

“He will probably go into the diplomatic service.”

She spoke the words and saw, in a flash, before her eyes, Rome, De Staffelaer, all her vain past. And, in that half-darkened room, in that hour of absolute sincerity, she asked herself whether that career would spell happiness for her son.

“Will Van der Welcke like that? . . .”

“Yes, but Addie must decide for himself. We shall not force him.”

There was a knock at the door; and Henri put his head into the room:

“May I come in, Mamma?”

“Yes, what is it? Here’s Aunt Constance.”

“How are you, Aunt? I came to see how you are, Mamma.”

The undergraduate was a tall boy of just twenty, with a pale, gentle face and dressed with the ultra-smartness of a youth who is “in the swim” at Leiden.

“Pretty well, my boy.”

“I shall go back to Leiden to-morrow, Mamma.”

“Oh?”

“Yes; and I shall probably not be home for some time. I mean to work hard. . . .”

“That’s right.”

“There’s really nothing else to do but work. It’s