If he had made no reference to his mother’s faintness, I should have answered him spiritedly.  But I remembered my own little mother, and her longing when fatigued for a cup of hot tea.

“I’m awfully sorry, Dicky,” I said meekly.  “You see you arrived before I thought you would.  I’ll get the tea for her the moment we reach the house.”

But Dicky was not mollified.  He stalked moodily ahead of me until he reached the open door of the taxicab.  Then his manner underwent a sudden change.  One would have thought him the most devoted of husbands to see him draw me forward.

“Mother,” he said, and my heart glowed even in its resentment at the note of pride in his voice, “this is my wife.  Madge, my mother.”

Mrs. Graham was leaning back against the cushions of the taxicab.  If she had not looked so white and ill I should have resented the look of displeasure that rested upon her features.

“How do you do?” she said coldly.  “You must pardon me, I am afraid, for not saying the usual things.  I have been very much upset.”

The studied insolence of the apology was infinitely worse than the coldness of her manner.  I waited for a moment to control myself before answering her.

“I am afraid that you are really ill,” I said as cordially as I could.  “I am so sorry to have kept you waiting, but I did not expect you quite so soon, and I had some errands.”

“It doesn’t matter,” she said indifferently.  Her manner put me aside from her consideration as if I had been a child or a servant.  She turned to Dicky.

“Are we almost there, dear?”

The warmth of her tones to him, the love displayed in every inflection, set out in more bitter contrast the coldness with which she was treating me.

“Right here now,” as the taxi drew up to the door of the apartment house.  There was a peculiar inflection in Dicky’s voice.  I stole a glance at him.  He was gazing at his mother with a puzzled look.  I fancied I saw also a trace of displeasure.  But it vanished in another minute as he sprang to the ground, paid the driver and helped his mother and me out.

She leaned heavily on his arm as we went up the stairs to the third floor upon which our apartment was.

At the door, Katie, who evidently had heard the taxicab, stood smiling broadly.

“This is Katie, mother,” Dicky said kindly.  “She will help take care of you.”

“How do you do, Katie?” The words were the same, but the tones were much kinder than her greeting to me.

Dicky assisted her into the living room.  She sank into the armchair, and Dicky took off her hat and loosened her cloak.  She leaned her head against the back of the chair, and her face looked so drawn and white that I felt alarmed.

“Katie, prepare a cup of strong tea immediately,” I directed, and Katie vanished.  “Is there nothing I can do for you, Mrs. Graham?” I approached her chair.