your repentance, and agree to marry Fanny right away, we will forgive you everything. We will ascribe your past conduct to the fascination which that Frenchwoman exerted over you. We will forgive and forget it. But if you persist in your own vicious desires, you know from the above what to expect.
"Eunice C. Ormizon."
"P.S.—Oh, Stephen, Stephen, don't break your old mother's heart. Come home to me, my dearest son, and make me happy by marrying Fanny. Remember, you promised me you would. Don't you consider a promise sacred? Come home; and we will never refer to this unfortunate affair again. Fanny is such a lovely, angelic girl—how can you think of anybody else? She will welcome you with open arms, and give you full pardon. Telegraph me that you will do as I wish. I am so unhappy, thinking that this one deepest wish of my heart, which I have cherished for so many years, is to be disappointed. Telegraph me, and then sail, as you intended, on the 26th. You should arrive not later than the 5th or 6th of October. Then we can have the wedding at once—say, on the 17th, which is Fanny's birthday.—Recollect, if you disobey me in this matter, I shall stick to every word that I have written above.—E. C. O."
Abuse, threats, entreaties!
Stephen Ormizon read this letter through, standing up. Then he allowed it to drop from his grasp and flutter to the floor. "Just what I might have expected!" he groaned, through clinched teeth, and, sinking upon a chair, covered his face with his hands, sore, angry, sick at heart. How insulting it was! How unjust, how unreasonable! How hard and—yes, and vulgar! Just what he might have expected, he had said; and yet he had not expected anything of the kind. The coarse vituperation of it surprised as much as it hurt him. He was a coward, a poltroon, a monster of ingratitude, etc., etc. True, it had always been this way. In every difference that he had ever had with his mother, she had exhibited a masterly aptitude for calling names; and he had heard a good many times before that he was this, that, and the other dreadful thing. Yet now, notwithstanding, he was completely staggered and taken aback, as by a blow in the face. If he had been lashed with a whip, he could not have suffered a keener or more furious sense of outrage. His set jaws, his scowling brows, his rigid limbs, his quivering nostrils, his swift breathing, told more plainly than his tongue could have done, of how that letter had made him smart.
He sat still for a while, grinding his teeth together with such force it was a wonder he did not break them; drumming with the sole of his boot upon the floor; overwhelmed by his pain and his indignation. Now and then his feelings would seek to vent themselves, and find relief, in a good strong Saxon oath, muttered half aloud. At length he jumped up and began pacing back and forth through his room.
What should he do about it ? What action had he best take?
