“You say your comrades know nothing of your family history?” she had said to him on the journey thither.  “What are you going to tell them?”

“Nothin’, ‘cept your bein’ my old mother,” said Prosper hopelessly.

“That’s not enough, my son.” (Another embarrassment to Prosper was her easy grasp of the maternal epithets.) “Now listen!  You were born just six months after your father, Captain Riggs (formerly Pottinger) sailed on his first voyage.  You remember very little of him, of course, as he was away so much.”

“Hadn’t I better know suthin about his looks?” said Prosper submissively.

“A tall dark man, that’s enough,” responded Mrs. Pottinger sharply.

“Hadn’t he better favor me?” said Prosper, with his small cunning recognizing the fact that he himself was a decided blond.

“Ain’t at all necessary,” said the widow firmly.  “You were always wild and ungovernable,” she continued, “and ran away from school to join some Western emigration.  That accounts for the difference of our styles.”

“But,” continued Prosper, “I oughter remember suthin about our old times—­runnin’ arrants for you, and bringin’ in the wood o’ frosty mornin’s, and you givin’ me hot doughnuts,” suggested Prosper dubiously.

“Nothing of the sort,” said Mrs. Pottinger promptly.  “We lived in the city, with plenty of servants.  Just remember, Prosper dear, your mother wasn’t that low-down country style.”

Glad to be relieved from further invention, Prosper was, nevertheless, somewhat concerned at this shattering of the ideal mother in the very camp that had sung her praises.  But he could only trust to her recognizing the situation with her usual sagacity, of which he stood in respectful awe.

Joe Wynbrook and Cyrus Brewster had, as older members of the camp, purposely lingered near the new house to offer any assistance to “Prossy and his mother,” and had received a brief and passing introduction to the latter.  So deep and unexpected was the impression she made upon them that these two oracles of the camp retired down the hill in awkward silence for some time, neither daring to risk his reputation by comment or oversurprise.

But when they approached the curious crowd below awaiting them, Cyrus Brewster ventured to say, “Struck me ez ef that old gal was rather high-toned for Prossy’s mother.”

Joe Wynbrook instantly seized the fatal admission to show the advantage of superior insight:—­

“Struck you!  Why, it was no more than I expected all along!  What did we know of Prossy?  Nothin’!  What did he ever tell us’?  Nothin’!  And why’?  ’Cos it was his secret.  Lord! a blind mule could see that.  All this foolishness and simplicity o’ his come o’ his bein’ cuddled and pampered as a baby.  Then, like ez not, he was either kidnapped or led away by some feller—­and nearly broke his mother’s heart.  I’ll bet my bottom dollar he has been advertised for afore this—­only we didn’t see the paper.  Like as not they had agents out seekin’ him, and he jest ran into their hands in ‘Frisco!  I had a kind o’ presentiment o’ this when he left, though I never let on anything.”