Mrs. White continued in the same sarcastic tone,—­

“Pray go and help move all their baggage in, Stephen, if it would give you any pleasure.  It is nothing to me, I am sure, if you choose to be all the time doing all sorts of things for everybody.  I don’t see the least occasion for it, that’s all.”

“It seems to me only common neighborliness and friendly courtesy, mother,” replied Stephen, gently.  “But you know you and I never agree upon such points.  Our views are radically different, and it is best not to discuss them.”

“Views!” ejaculated Mrs. White, in a voice more like the low growl of some animal than like any sound possible to human organs.  “I don’t want to hear any thing about ‘views’ about such a trifle.  Why don’t you go, if you want to, and be done with it?”

“It is too late now,” answered Stephen, in the same unruffled tone.  “They have gone in, and the carriage is driving off.”

“Well, perhaps they would like to have you put down their carpets for them, or open their boxes,” sneered Mrs. White, still with the same intolerable sarcastic manner.  “I don’t doubt they could find some use for your services.”

“O mother, don’t!” pleaded Stephen, “please don’t.  I do not wish to go near them or ever see them, if it will make you any less happy.  Do let us talk of something else.”

“Who ever said a word about your not going near them, I’d like to know?  Have I ever tried to shut you up, or keep you from going anywhere you wanted to?  Answer me that, will you?”

“No, mother,” answered Stephen, “you never have.  But I wish I could make you happier.”

“You do make me very happy, Steve,” said Mrs. White, mollified by the gentle answer.  “You’re a good boy, and always was; but it does vex me to see you always so ready to be at everybody’s beck and call; and, where it’s a woman, it naturally vexes me more.  You wouldn’t want to run any risk of being misunderstood, or making a woman care about you more than she ought.”

Stephen stared.  This was a new field.  Had his mother gone already thus far in her thoughts about Mercy Philbrick?  And was her only thought of the possibility of the young woman’s caring for him, and not in the least of his caring for her?

And what would ever become of the peace of their daily life, if this kind of jealousy—­the most exacting, most insatiable jealousy in the world—­were to grow up in her heart?  Stephen was dumb with despair.  The apparent confidential friendliness and assumption of a tacit understanding and agreement between him and her on the matter, with which his mother had said, “You wouldn’t want to be misunderstood, or make a woman care more for you than she ought,” struck terror to his very soul.  The apparent amicableness of her remark at the present moment did not in the least blind him to the enormous possibilities of future misery involved in such a train of feeling and thought on her part.  He foresaw himself involved in a perfect network of espionage and cross-questioning and suspicion, in comparison with which all he had hitherto borne at his mother’s hands would seem trivial.  All this flashed through his mind in the brief instant that he hesitated before he replied in an off-hand tone, which for once really blinded his mother,—­