"
"It's quite impossible to stop it now," interrupted Lady Shuttleworth
in the greatest distress; of Lavengro she had never heard.
"Yes you can, mother. Write and put it off."
"Write? What could I write? To-day is Tuesday, and they all arrive on
Friday. What excuse can I make at the last moment? And how can a
birthday be put off? My dearest boy, I simply can't." And Lady
Shuttleworth, the sensible, the cheery, the resourceful, the
perennially brave, wrung her hands and began quite helplessly to cry.
This unusual and pitiful sight at once conquered Tussie. For a moment
he stood aghast; then his arms were round his mother, and he promised
everything she wanted. What he said to her besides and what she sobbed
back to him I shall not tell. They never spoke of it again; but for
years they both looked back to it, that precious moment of clinging
together with bursting hearts, her old cheek against his young one,
her tears on his face, as to one of the most acutely sweet, acutely,
painfully, tender experiences of their joint lives.
It will be conceded that Priscilla had achieved a good deal in the one
week that had passed since she laid aside her high estate and stepped
down among ordinary people for the purpose of being and doing good.
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