Harry Edgham, who had deposited the peaches in the ice-box, and had been about to enter the room, retreated.  He went out the other door himself, and round upon the piazza, when presently the smoke of his cigar stole into the room.  Then Mrs. Edgham included him in her wrath.

“You and your father are just alike,” said she, bitterly.  “You both of you will do just what you want to, whether or no.  He will smoke, though he knows it makes me worse, besides costing more than he can afford, and you will put on your best dress, without asking leave, and wear it out in a damp night, and spoil it.”

Maria continued to stand still, and her mother to regard her with that odd mixture of worshipful love and chiding.  Suddenly Mrs. Edgham closed her mouth more tightly.

“Stand round here,” said she, violently.  “Let me unbutton your dress.  I don’t see how you fastened it up yourself, anyway; you wouldn’t have thought you could, if it hadn’t been for deceiving your mother.  You would have come down to me to do it, the way you always do.  You have got it buttoned wrong, anyway.  You must have been a sight for the folks who sat behind you.  Well, it serves you right.  Stand round here.”

“I am sorry,” said Maria then.  She wondered whether the wrong fastening had showed much through the slats of the settee.

Her mother unfastened, with fingers that were at once gentle and nervous, the pearl buttons on the back of the dress.  “Take your arms out,” said she to Maria.  Maria cast a glance at the window.  “There’s nobody out there but your father,” said Mrs. Edgham, harshly, “take your arms out.”

Maria took her arms out of the fluffy mass and stood revealed in her little, scantily trimmed underwaist, a small, childish figure, with the utmost delicacy of articulation as to shoulder-blades and neck.  Maria was thin to the extreme, but her bones were so small that she was charming even in her thinness.  Her little, beautifully modelled arms were as charming as a fairy’s.

“Now slip off your skirt,” ordered her mother, and Maria complied and stood in her little white petticoat, with another glance of the exaggerated modesty of little girlhood at the window.

“Now,” said her mother, “you go and hang this up in the kitchen where it is warm, on that nail on the outside door, and maybe some of the creases will come out.  I’ve heard they would.  I hope so, for I’ve got about all I want to do without ironing this dress all over.”

Maria gazed at her mother with sudden compunction and anxious love.  After all, she loved her mother down to the depths of her childish heart; it was only that long custom had so inured her to the loving that she did not always realize the warmth of her heart because of it.  “Do you feel sick to-night mother?” she whispered.

“No sicker than usual,” replied her mother.  Then she drew the delicate little figure close to her, and kissed her with a sort of passion.  “May the Lord look out for you,” she said, “if you should happen to outlive me!  I don’t know what would become of you, Maria, you are so heedless, wearing your best things every day, and everything.”