My mother turned deadly pale, and dropped the hot iron from her hand, so
as to spoil a frilled nightcap belonging to one of her lady customers.
She staggered to a chair, and trembled all over. I really believe that
had she been aware of his being about to return, she would have quitted
Greenwich before his arrival; but now it was too late. Virginia had run
for the salts as soon as she perceived that her mother was unwell, and
as she smelled them she gradually recovered. At last she inquired how my
father looked and what he said.

I told her that he had lost his leg, and had been sent as a pensioner to
the hospital; that he had looked very well, and that he had told me to
say that "he was in a perfect good humor, and it would be her fault if
she put him out of it; and that if she did--"

"Well, what then?" inquired my mother.

"Oh, the _tail_--that's all."

At the mention of the tail my mother very nearly went off in a
swoon--her head fell back, and I heard her mutter, "So vulgar! so
ungenteel!" However, she recovered herself, and appeared to be for some
time in deep thought. At last she rose up, ordered me to fetch something
extra for supper, and recommenced her ironing.

As soon as I had executed her commission I went to the hospital, where I
found my father, who, with the other men, had just been dismissed. He
accompanied me to my mother, shook hands with her very good-humoredly,
kissed Virginia, whom he took on his knee, praised the supper, drank
only one pot of porter, and then returned to the hospital, to sleep in