the thing shamefully clear, she went down-stairs and faced the
situation. Who was responsible for it? Who was to blame--before
she could add, in her mind, "Elizabeth or Blair?" some trick of
memory finished her question: who was to blame--"_this man or
his parents?_" The suggestion of personal responsibility was
like a blow in the face. She flinched under it, and sat down
abruptly, breathing hard. How could it be possible that she was
to blame? What had she left undone that other mothers did? She
had loved him; no mother could have loved him more than she did!--
and he had never cared for her love. In what had she been
lacking? He had had a religious bringing up; she had begun to
take him to church when he was four years old. He had had every
educational opportunity. All that he wanted he had had. She had
never stinted him in anything. Could any mother have done more?
Could Herbert himself have done more? No; she could not reproach
herself for lack of love. She had loved him, so that she had
spared him everything--even desire! All that he could want was
his before he could ask for it.

In the midst of this angry justifying of herself, tramping up and
down the long room, she stopped suddenly and looked about her;
where was her knitting? Her thoughts were in such a distracted
tangle that the accustomed automatic movement of her fingers was
imperative. She tucked the grimy pink ball of zephyr under her
arm, and tightening her fingers on the bent and yellowing old
needles, began again her fierce pacing up and down, up and down.
But the room seemed to cramp her, and by and by she went across
the hall into Nannie's parlor, where the fire had sprung into
cheerful flames; here she paused for a while, standing with one
foot on the fender, knitting rapidly, her unseeing eyes fixed on