But she showed no sign of it.  She spoke in the most detached way of his blindness and the coming ceremony.  Never once, even on the first occasion when I met her—­in the hospital corridor—­after my return from London, did her attitude vary from that of any kind-hearted Englishwoman who deplores the mutilation of a gallant social acquaintance.  Sometimes I wanted to shake her, though I could scarcely tell why.  I certainly would not have had her weep on my shoulder over Boyce’s misfortune; nor would I have cared for her to exhibit a vindictive callousness.  She behaved with perfect propriety.  Perhaps that is what disturbed me.  I was not accustomed to associate perfect propriety with my dear Betty.

The days went on.  The reception arrangements were perfected.  We only waited for the date of Boyce’s arrival to be fixed.  That depended on the date of the particular Investiture by the King which Boyce’s convalescence should allow him to attend.  At last the date was fixed.

A few days before the Investiture I went to London and called at Lady Fanshawe’s in Eccleston Street, whither he had been removed after leaving the hospital.  I was received in the dining-room on the ground floor by Boyce and his mother.  He wore black glasses to hide terrible disfigurement—­he lifted them to show me.  One eye had been extracted.  The other was seared and sightless.  He greeted me as heartily as ever, made little jests over his infirmity, treating it lightly for his mother’s sake.  She, on her side, deemed it her duty to exhibit equal cheerfulness.  She boasted of his progress in self-reliance and in the accomplishment of various little blind man’s tricks.  At her bidding he lit a cigarette for my benefit, by means of a patent fuse.  He said, when he had succeeded: 

“Better than the last time you saw me, eh, Meredyth?”

“What was that?” asked Mrs. Boyce.

“He nearly burned his fingers,” said I, shortly.  I had no desire to relate the incident.

We talked of the coming ceremony and I gave them the details of the programme.  Boyce had been right in accepting on the score of his mother.  Only once had she been the central figure in any public ceremony—­on her wedding day, in the years long ago.  Here was a new kind of wedding day in her old age.  The prospect filled her with a tremulous joy which was to both of them a compensation.  She bubbled over with pride and excitement at her inclusion in the homage that was to be paid to the valour of her only son.

“After all,” she said, “I did bring him into the world.  So I can claim some credit.  I only hope I shan’t cry and make a fool of myself.  They won’t expect me to keep on bowing, will they?  I once saw Queen Victoria driving through the streets, and I thought how dreadfully her poor old neck must have ached.”

On the latter point I reassured her.  On the drive from the station Boyce would take the salute of the troops on the line of route.  If she smiled charmingly on them, their hearts would be satisfied, and if she just nodded at them occasionally in a motherly sort of way, they would be enchanted.  She informed me that she was having a new dress made for the occasion.  She had also bought a new hat, which I must see.  A servant was summoned and dispatched for it.  She tried it on girlishly before the mirror over the mantelpiece, and received my compliments.