IDEAL CONDITIONS

Erskine Burnham's lesson was short, but sharp, and he seemed to have learned it thoroughly. He gave himself more persistently to study than before, and was even more devoted to his mother than ever, if that were possible. He let the visiting sisters of freshmen and sophomores dignifiedly alone, and resisted without a sigh numerous attempts to draw him into local society circles.

"Haven't time for society just now," was his invariable excuse. "Nor inclination," he would add privately for his mother's benefit.

Occasionally the mother urged the acceptance of an invitation and begged him not to make a recluse of himself for her sake; but he met her suggestions with his whimsical smile and the gay retort that a society composed of two entirely congenial people met all his present requirements. She was not insistent. Why should she be, when Erskine was undeniably happy in the life he had planned?

Certainly it was an ideal life for the fond mother; for both of them, perhaps. It had been unique from the first of Erskine's college course. They had been settled but a few weeks in their new home when Mrs. Burnham, finding much time at her disposal, proposed to Erskine that she take up some of her long-ago-dropped studies and let him introduce her to modern college ways. The young man laughed as he gave her an admiring glance and assured her that she knew more than other women, already. Nevertheless it pleased him to go into careful detail about his work, and on the following day it surprised as well as pleased him to find that his mother was quite as well prepared with some of his studies as he was himself. From that evening a new order of things was established; Mrs. Burnham, without matriculating as a college student, and without letting it be known, save to the choice few who were their very intimate friends, became nevertheless a student. How much of Erskine Burnham's acknowledged success in college was due to the fact that his mother studied with him throughout the entire course is something that will never be known; but her son gave her full credit for the help that she was to him. From the first he recognized her as a stimulant; he discovered that he must have his points very fully in his grasp in order to explain them satisfactorily to his pupil. She always insisted on being his pupil and kept carefully the subordinate place, although her keen questionings more than once led him to change his view of a subject under discussion.

Altogether, it was a life replete with satisfaction to both mother and son. Not that they shut themselves away from society. Such of his friends as Erskine thought his mother would enjoy or could help he brought freely to their rooms, and between several of the students and herself there was built up by degrees that kind of friendship which one occasionally sees between self-respecting young men and certain middle-aged women. It was a very pleasant experience, and it made Ruth feel, as she expressed it to Erskine, that she had several sons always ready to serve her.

Neither did they wholly neglect the outside world. Both mother and son held carefully to their resolve not to let college or any other functions interfere with their Sunday and mid-week engagements in the church of their choice, and through this channel they made certain acquaintances that ripened into friendship. But there came a time in the mother's life when she wished, not that she had enjoyed her studies with Erskine less, but that both of them had given more time and thought and enjoyment to distinctively religious themes and duties.

Meantime their friendship for Alice Warder ripened and deepened, although there had been an interim during which its very life had seemed to be threatened. Following that painful episode with Mamie Parker, Erskine had seemed to shun even Alice Warder. He had not from the first been entirely sure that he cared to see much of her Boston cousin, and presently made him an excuse for seeing little of Alice, for the cousin seemed to be staying indefinitely. This state of things lasted until the college year closed and they went home, and became again next-door neighbors to the Warders. At first, it seemed to Mrs. Burnham that the old friendship was lost. Something very vague and intangible, but distinctly felt, seemed to have come between them. Then, suddenly, whatever it was, it passed. On a certain evening that stood out plainly afterward in the mother's memory Alice had appeared at her window with an air of decision, and a question.

"Has Erskine come in yet, Mrs. Burnham? When he comes, will you ask him if he can give me an uninterrupted half-hour this evening for something special?"

Later, the mother wondered, and often wondered what that something special was, but she had not been told. It was something that made a marked difference in Erskine's manner. From apparently avoiding Alice Warder's society as much as possible, he frankly sought it; proposing her as a third on occasions when his mother would have hesitated, and in every possible way proclaiming that the old cordial relations were reestablished. From that time on, the young woman next door became so entirely identified with the daily life of the Burnhams that the intimate friends of the family said "Alice and Erskine," quite as a matter of course.

In the fall they went back to college, mother and son. At least that was Erskine's way of putting it.

"Why not?" he said, laughing at his mother's protest. "You are as much in college as I am. They ought to give you a diploma. I believe I'll divide mine; have the sheepskin cut exactly in two, and your name inserted. Half of my honors belong to you, anyhow."

During his senior year Erskine and Alice Warder were more inseparable than ever. Mr. Warder went abroad on an extended business trip, which was so entirely business that he would have little or no time for Alice, and she chose to be left behind. But her friend who had lived with her as a companion, since she had ceased to be a governess, wanted the winter for her personal friends, so it was decided that Alice should secure rooms at the same house where the Burnhams boarded and be chaperoned by Mrs. Burnham. This made them practically one family, though each adhered to his own programme. Alice gave much time to correspondence, and interested herself at once in special church work; while Mrs. Burnham continued to study with her son. But in all social functions, and indeed, in all their leisure time, they were together quite as a family.

It was during this winter that Mrs. Burnham took up a study quite by herself and made diligent effort in it. This was the study of adjusting herself to new relations. She was getting acquainted with and growing used to her daughter, she told herself hopefully; for by this time she had fully decided that Alice Warder was the one who was to share through all their future Erskine's love and care. She grew more than reconciled; she told herself that she was perfectly happy in Erskine's choice; that of course she wanted him to marry, she had always wanted it; and where in all the earth could he have found a more lovely character or a more entirely acceptable person in every way than Alice Warder? It really seemed as though a special Providence had planned and created them each for the other.

As the intimacy deepened, so that the three seemed to think in unison, the mother told herself cheerfully that it was almost as though the two were married already; there would be no strange chasm to bridge over when that time came; nor would they have to readjust themselves in any way. Alice had not known a mother's love and care since childhood, and she turned as naturally to Mrs. Burnham for mothering as though they were really mother and daughter. It was all ideal.

There were times, of course, when Mrs. Burnham could not help sitting in secret judgment on certain ways and words of this daughter of hers. She would allow herself to wish that this or that had been different, and then would bring herself to order with severity, assuring herself that she had no right to expect perfection, and where, on this earth, could there be found another girl so near it as Alice?

Over one phase of the girl's life this mother in all sincerity rejoiced. Alice was unquestionably and deeply religious. Her Christian life was deep-rooted and pervasive, and the perfume of its flowering filled her days. To come in contact with her for even a short interview was to discover that religion with her was not merely a duty, but a joy.

"Alice is very unusual in this respect," Ruth said to Erskine. "It isn't simply that she is regular and methodical in her Christianity as in everything else. I have seen girls before who went to prayer-meeting, for instance, regularly, from a sense of duty; but with Alice it is this, and something more. She looks forward to it as a pleasure; and she comes from it uplifted and advanced in her Christian experience."

Erskine was hearty in his response.

"Yes, Alice takes hold of life generally with a kind of joyful enthusiasm that is delicious. And there is contagion in it; I enjoy the mid-week meetings better myself, since I have learned to plan for them as she does."

Everything considered, that last year of college life passed all too quickly, at least for Mrs. Burnham. There were times when she realized that the peculiarly close relations which she and her son had sustained for four beautiful winters could not, in reason, continue, and she shrank from any change. Yet for the most part she was strong in her gratitude that her son's college life had been what it had been, and that the most censorious could not discover any evil results from this long, close fellowship with his mother. There were still years of study for him. It had been decided that he would study law in the city where his father had practised it, and live at the old homestead, making daily trips to and from the larger city. In due course of time, therefore, they were once more settled at home for an indefinite period. Alice Warder had gone to the coast of Maine for a long-promised visit among her mother's relatives, but on her return, the Warders were again to become next-door neighbors.

Already in her letters to Mrs. Burnham, which were quite as frequent as those to Erskine, Alice Warder was planning certain functions in which "You and father, and Erskine and I" were in evidence.

There was one feature of the situation that troubled the mother. As the days passed the question which it involved grew more and more insistent. Why did not Erskine, at least, confide in her? Had he not from his very babyhood been in the habit of bringing to her not only every joy and sorrow, but every passing emotion or fancy, however trivial, until she had believed them as nearly one as it was possible for two people to become? Why then, in this supreme decision of his life, had she in a sense been counted out? No hint as to his new hopes and plans had been put into words for her; she had simply been left like the rest of the world to take things for granted.

There were times when this question probed her keenly. She struggled to discover whether she had been in fault. Despite her earnest efforts to hold herself well in check and give no sign of certain emotions which every true mother must feel at such an hour, had she failed? Had she appeared cold, or indifferent, or, worse than either, jealous? Despite her careful cross-examination of herself she could not lay her finger upon any word or act that she could make different; and she was obliged to content herself with redoubling her efforts to show her entire acceptance of Alice as one of them; but so far as any special confidences were concerned she did it in vain. Both Erskine and Alice were entirely frank in their manifest interest in each other, acting at all times as though they had nothing to conceal. They had even reached the stage when they claimed each other's time and attention as a matter of course, and so expressed themselves.

Erskine, for instance, would glance at a note that had been laid on his desk a short time before, and explain to his mother:—

"I shall have to defer my call on Dr. West, mother, until some other evening. Alice has to meet her committee at the hall, and wants me to take her over."

Could anything, argued the mother, indicate more surely that they two had already passed the early stages of sentiment, and begun to realize that they belonged to each other for convenience as well as for love? Then why did they not confide in his mother, their mother?

No comparatively small matter had ever troubled Ruth Burnham more than did this one. There were times when she felt almost indignant, and was on the verge of saying to them both that she did not think she deserved such careless treatment at their hands. Why, her very intimate friends were almost asking when the wedding was to be! There were other times when she told herself that she would not be the first to speak, even though they kept silence until the wedding day was come.

Matters were in this state when she reached another distinct milestone in the singularly marked journey of her life.