“Now I s’pose You’ll be thinkin’ that you don’t have t’ care for what a man says.”
Elizabeth laughed, but not in her usual merry way.
“Perhaps,” she said slowly. “I was thinking farther than that—I was wondering——” She paused to think and then broke out suddenly. “John’s written to ask if he can come back, and I was just wondering——”
Mrs. Farnshaw was all animation at once, her own troubles forgotten.
“You don’t say?” she exclaimed. “Now look here, Lizzie, you’re goin’ t’ let him come?”
Elizabeth had told her mother on the impulse of the moment after withholding the news from Nathan and even from Jack. The child had been wriggling out of his grandmother’s arms and had not heard what his mother said. Elizabeth waited till he was out of hearing. She half regretted having mentioned it. She was going to have to argue out her decision with her mother, and she had made no decision.
The mother’s accidental remark had produced the impulse to tell. Well, it was all right. It might be that she could decide better after discussing it with some one. Elizabeth looked at her mother doubtfully.
“I don’t know, ma. I may. It’s all owing to whether we can agree on the terms of starting over.”
“You ain’t goin’ t’ lay down rules t’ him?” the mother cried in amazement.
“Now’s my time to find out what rules he’s going to lay down to me at least,” Elizabeth said dryly.