Irving threw back his head, and his ringing laugh caused Mrs. Bruce to look wonderingly down the garden.
“An absolute monarchy, eh?” he responded. “And you have the habit so, you want to tyrannize over me still?”
“Don’t leave me with the feelin’ that you want to shirk out of it by foolin’,” pursued Betsy, refusing to smile, and rising, conscious of Mrs. Bruce’s gaze.
Irving rose also and threw his arm tenderly around her thin shoulders as they moved toward the house.
She tried to escape, but the gentle vise held.
“You’ve made me feel very sentimental, referring as you have to our past, Betsy,” he said emotionally. “Know’st thou these verses, beginning—
“‘There is no friend like the old friend, who has shared our morning days’ (and teething nights!)”
“Please, Mr. Irving!”
With a desperate wriggle, Betsy escaped, and moved swiftly around toward the back door of the cottage.