Jerome seemed suddenly no longer her son; the memory of the time when she had cradled and swaddled him failed her.

The spirit of his father awakened in him filled her at once with strangeness and awed recognition.
She heard the boy pattering about in the kitchen, and, in spite of herself, the conviction that his father was out there, doing the morning task which had been his for so many years, was strong upon her.
When at length Jerome and Elmira came and told her breakfast was ready, and assisted her to rise and dress, she was as unquestioningly docile as if the relationship between them were reversed.

When she was seated in her chair she even forbore, as was her wont, to start immediately with sharp sidewise jerks of her rocker, but waited until her children pushed and drew her out into the next room, up to the breakfast-table.

There were, moreover, no sharp commands and chidings as to the household tasks that morning.

Jerome and Elmira did as they would, and their mother sat quietly and ate her breakfast.
Elmira kept staring at her mother, and then glancing uneasily at Jerome.