Wesley's mother believed in
much more than the city church. She believed her son to be capable of
anything. "I shall have a large salary, mother," boasted Wesley, "and
you shall have the best clothes money can buy, and the parsonage is
sure to be beautiful."
"How will your old mother look in fine feathers, in such a beautiful
home?" asked Wesley's mother, but she asked as a lovely, much-petted
woman asks such a question. She had her little conscious smile all
ready for the rejoinder which she knew her son would not fail to
give. He was very proud of his mother.
"Why, mother," he said, "as far as that goes, I wouldn't balk at a
throne for you as queen dowager."
"You are a silly boy," said Mrs. Elliot, but she stole a glance at
herself in an opposite mirror, and smiled complacently. She did not
look old enough to be the mother of her son. She was tall and
slender, and fair-haired, and she knew how to dress well on her very
small income. She was rosy, and carried herself with a sweet
serenity. People said Wesley would not need a wife as long as he had
such a mother. But he did not have her long. Only a month later she
died, and while the boy was still striving to play the role of hero
in that calamity, there came news of another. His professor friend
had a son in the trenches. The son had been wounded, and the father
had obeyed a hurried call, found his son dead, and himself died of
the shock on the return voyage. Wesley, mourning the man who had been
his stanch friend, was guiltily conscious of his thwarted ambition.
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