He lay back on his pillow, and looked at her. "You used to be my aunt,—my aunt Maria," he said.
"I'm your aunt Maria still," she answered. "It's very good of you not to have forgotten me."
"It's very good of you not to have forgotten me," said Mason, in a tone which betrayed a deeper feeling than the wish to return a civil speech.
"Dear me, you've had the war and a hundred dreadful things. I've been living in Europe, you know. Since my return I've been living in the country, in your uncle's old house on the river, of which the lease had just expired when I came home. I came to town yesterday on business, and accidentally heard of your condition and your whereabouts. I knew you'd gone into the army, and I had been wondering a dozen times what had become of you, and whether you wouldn't turn up now that the war's at last over. Of course I didn't lose a moment in coming to you. I'm so sorry for you." Mrs. Mason looked about her for a seat. The chairs were encumbered with odds and ends belonging to her nephew's wardrobe and to his equipment, and with the remnants of his last repast. The good lady surveyed the scene with the beautiful mute irony of compassion.
The young man lay watching her comely face in delicious submission to whatever form of utterance
