“There is no obligation where there is a graceless, disobedient son who perjures himself and defies his mother.”
“Perjures himself?”
“Did you not, an hour since, promise to marry Trynje van der Deen?”
“I said I would consider it after a while, but there was then nothing of all this. My troth to Alaine I believed severed by her marriage. Now it is different.”
“You cannot marry without my consent; the laws of our colony forbid.”
“Then I will not marry while Alaine is free.”
“And Trynje?”
Trynje had come out and was listening wonderingly. She nestled her hand in Alaine’s and spoke up. “Trynje, madam, does not desire to marry Lendert Verplanck. She prefers to let her parents select for her. You have shown her how very unpleasant a mother can be, and Trynje does not like discord. Lendert Verplanck, I am Alaine’s friend; I love her. I wish her happiness, and my own will not suffer by reason of you, be sure of that.”
Madam standing alone in the doorway with all arrayed against her awoke Trynje’s pity, and she went over to her. “Dear Madam De Vries,” she said, “it would be a very pleasant thing if you would agree with the rest of us and let us be merry over this instead of angry. It was but this morning that you spoke very sweetly of Alaine, and she is the same now as then.”
Madam withdrew the hand Trynje had taken. “Little fool,” she muttered, “if you had but claimed your own we could yet have our own way.”