"Don't you be afraid of Mrs. de Cressiers. Austin and I will manage her all right; and I'm not a child, Cousin John. And you can pretend you know nothing about it, if you would rather not. It has nothing to do with you, has it? And we have settled it up on the river, not even in this house, so you can't be in any way responsible."
She talked to him in the way that a modern girl would; as if she, and she alone, were the only one responsible for her future. And Mr. Borlace, who did not understand girls, and had come to look upon Jockie as a very original specimen of her race, at last sat back in his chair with a resigned sigh.
"Well, you must 'gang your own gait'; only don't ask me to express my opinion upon such an altogether unexpected and unsuitable union."
And then Austin laughed, shook him warmly by the hand, and departed, wondering how he would get through the coming interview with his mother.
Manlike, he hated scenes, and he knew that his mother's hopes did not rest upon Jockie as a daughter-in-law. He went straight to her boudoir, and found her writing letters at her davenport.
"Now, mother," he said gaily, "when do you intend to get old, and sit in an arm-chair before the fire knitting for the poor? Isn't that the role of all good old ladies?"
"Not when the thermometer stands at seventy-eight," said his mother dryly.
But she left her writing and sat down in her easy chair. Austin stood on the hearthrug warming his back at an imaginary fire.
"Are you only just back?" she asked him. "I hope you have not been out with Jockie at this late hour?"
Austin did not answer; then he launched his bolt.