need to mind telling me that. I know my boy and I know what he'd want or not want'. She said 'You think – perhaps he's ashamed of you because he and you are poor and I'm rich, but it isn't like that at all. That isn't like him at all. It isn't, really it isn't.' I said again, 'You don't need to tell me, lass. I know what faults my boy has. That's not one of his faults. He's not ashamed of his mother and he's not ashamed of his beginnings.
''He's not ashamed of me.' I said to her, 'He's afraid of me if anything. I know too much about him, you see.' And that seemed to amuse her. She said: 'I expect mothers always feel like that – that they know all about their sons. And I expect sons always feel embarrassed just because of that!'
'I said in a way that might be true enough. When you're young, you're always putting on an act to the world. Mind myself, when I was a child in my auntie's house. On the wall over my bed there was a great big eye in a gilt frame. It said 'Thou God seest me.' Gave me the creeps it did all up my spine before I went to sleep.'
'Ellie should have told me she'd been to see you,' I said. 'I don't see why she should keep it such a secret. She should have told me.'
I was angry. I was very angry. I'd had no idea that Ellie would keep secrets like that from me.
'She was a little scared of what she'd done, maybe, but she'd no call to be frightened of you, my boy.'
'Come on,' I said, 'come on and see our house.'
I don't know whether she liked our house or not. I think not. She looked round the rooms and raised her eyebrows and then she went into the terrace room. Ellie and Greta were sitting there. They'd just come in from outside and Greta had a scarlet wool cloak half over her shoulders. My mother looked at them both. She just stood there for a moment as though rooted to the spot. Ellie jumped up and came forward and across the room.
'Oh, it's Mrs. Rogers,' she said, then turning to Greta, she said, 'It's Mike's mother come to see our house and us. Isn't that nice? This is my friend Greta Andersen.'
And she held out both her hands and took Mum's and Mum looked at her and then looked over her shoulder at Greta very hard.
'I see,' she said to herself, 'I see.'
'What do you see?' asked Ellie.
'I wondered,' said Mum. 'I wondered what it would all be like here.' She looked round her. 'Yes, it's a fine house. Fine curtains and fine chairs and fine pictures.'
'You must have some tea,' said Ellie.
'You look as if you've finished tea.'
'Tea's a thing that need never be finished,' said Ellie, then she said to Greta, 'I won't ring the bell. Greta, will you go out to the kitchen and make a fresh pot of tea?'
'Of course, darling,' said Greta and went out of the room looking over her shoulder once in a sharp, almost scared way at my mother.
My mother sat down.
'Where's your luggage?' said Ellie. 'Have you come to stay? I hope you have.'
'No, lass, I won't stay. I'm going back by train in half an hour's time. I just wanted to look in on you.' Then she added rather quickly, probably because she wished to get it out before Greta came back, 'Now don't worry yourself, love, I told him how you came to see me and paid me a visit.'
'I'm sorry, Mike, that I didn't tell you,' said Ellie firmly, 'only I thought perhaps I'd better not.'
'She came out of the kindness of her heart, she did,' said my mother. 'She's a good girl you've married, Mike, and a pretty one. Yes, a very pretty one.' Then she added half audibly, 'I am sorry.'
'Sorry,' said Ellie, faintly puzzled.
'Sorry for thinking the things I did,' said my mother and added with a slight air of strain, 'Well, as you say, mothers are like that. Always inclined to be suspicious of daughters-in-law. But when I saw you, I knew he'd been lucky. It seemed too good to be true to me, that it did.'
'What impertinence,' I said, but I smiled at her as I said it. 'I always had excellent taste.'
'You've always had expensive taste, that's what you mean,' said my mother and looked at the brocade curtains.
'I'm not really the worse for being an expensive taste,' said Ellie, smiling at her.
'You make him save a bit of money from time to time,' said Mum, 'it'll be good for his character.'
'I refuse to have my character improved,' I said. 'The advantage of taking a wife is that the wife thinks everything you do is perfect. Isn't that so, Ellie?'
Ellie was looking happy again now. She laughed and said,
'You're above yourself, Mike! The conceit of you.'
Greta came back then with the teapot. We'd been a little ill at ease and we were just getting over it. Somehow when Greta came back the strain came on again. My mother resisted all endeavours on Ellie's part to make her stay over and Ellie didn't insist after a short while. She and I walked down together with my mother along the winding drive through the trees and to the gateway.
'What do you call it?' my mother asked abruptly.
Ellie said, 'Gipsy's Acre…'
'Ah,' said my mother, 'yes, you've got gipsies around here, haven't you?'
'How did you know that?' I asked.
'I saw one as I came up. She looked at me queer, she did.'
'She's all right really,' I said, 'a little half baked, that's all.'
'Why do you say she's half baked? She'd a funny look to her when she looked at me. She's got a grievance against you of some kind?'
'I don't think it's real,' said Ellie. 'I think she's imagined it all. That we've done her out of her land or something like that.'
'I expect she wants money,' said my mother. 'Gipsies are like that. Make a big song and dance sometimes of how they've been done down one way or another. But they soon stop when they get some money in their itching palms.'
'You don't like gipsies,' said Ellie.
'They're a thieving lot. They don't work steady and they don't keep their hands off what doesn't belong to them.'
'Oh well,' Ellie said, 'we – we don't worry any more now.'
My mother said good-bye and then added, 'Who's the young lady that lives with you?'
Ellie explained how Greta had been with her for three years before she married and how but for Greta she would have had a miserable life.
'Greta's done everything to help us. She's a wonderful person,' said Ellie. 'I wouldn't know how to – how to get on without her.'
'She's living with you or on a visit?'
'Oh well,' said Ellie. She avoided the question. 'She – she's living with us at present because I sprained my ankle and had to have someone to look after me. But I'm all right again now.'
'Married people do best alone together when they're starting,' my mother said.
We stood by the gate watching my mother march away down the hill.
'She's got a very strong personality,' said Ellie thoughtfully.
I was angry with Ellie, really very angry because she'd gone and found out my mother and visited her without telling me. But when she turned and stood looking at me with one eyebrow raised a little and the funny half-timid, half-satisfied little girl smile on her face, I couldn't help relent.
'What a deceitful little thing you are,' I said.
'Well,' said Ellie, 'I've had to be sometimes, you know.'
'That's like a Shakespeare play I once saw. They did it at a school I was at.' I quoted rather self-consciously, ''She has deceiv'd her father and may thee'.'
'What did you play – Othello?'
'No,' I said, 'I played the girl's father. That's why I remember that speech, I suppose. It's practically the only thing I had to say.'
''She has deceiv'd her father and may thee',' said Ellie thoughtfully. 'I didn't ever deceive my father as far as I know. Perhaps I would have later.'
'I don't suppose he would have taken very kindly to your marrying me,' I said, 'any more than your
