"
This she said in a serious tone of voice, tender and sad, looking up
into his face with a plaintive gaze, as though she knew that she were
asking of him some great favour.
"Yes, mother, I have known that you have wished that."
"You have known it, Ludovic!"
"Oh, dear, yes; you are not at all sharp at keeping your secrets
from me. And, mother, at one time, for a day or so, I thought that I
could oblige you. You have been so good to me, that I would almost do
anything for you."
"Oh, no, no, no," she said, deprecating his praise, and the sacrifice
which he seemed to offer of his own hopes and aspirations. "I would
not for worlds have you do so for my sake. No mother ever had a
better son, and my only ambition is for your happiness."
"But, mother, she would not make me happy. I was mad enough for a
moment to think that she could do so--for a moment I did think so.
There was one occasion on which I would have asked her to take me,
but--"
"But what, Ludovic?"
"Never mind; it passed away; and now I shall never ask her. Indeed
I do not think she would have me. She is ambitious, and flying at
higher game than I am. And I must say this for her, that she knows
well what she is doing, and plays her cards as though she had been
born with them in her hand.
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