"I am young and strong," he said, "and, if God is good to me, I shall live for fifty years to come, or even longer. I tingle with joy, Bedelia, when I think of being near you for fifty years or more. Have—have you thought of it in that light? Have you looked ahead and said to yourself: fifty years have I to live and all of them with—"
"Hush! I was speaking of a week's journey, not of a life's voyage, Mr. Schmidt," she said, her face suffused.
"I was speaking of a honeymoon," said he, and then remembered Mrs. Gaston. She was leaning back in her chair, smiling benignly. He had an uncomfortable thought: was he walking into a trap set for him by this clever woman? Had she an ulterior motive in advancing his cause?
"But it would be perfectly silly of you to follow me in a car," said Bedelia, trying to regain her lost composure. "Perfectly silly, wouldn't it, Mrs. Gas-ton?"
"Perfectly," said Mrs. Gaston.
"I will promise to see you in Vienna—"
"I intend to see you every day," he declared, "from now till the end of time."
"Really, Mr. Schmidt, you—"
"If there is one thing I despise beyond all reason, Bedelia, it is the name of 'Schmidt'! I wish you wouldn't call me by that name."
"I can't just call you 'Mister,'" she demurred.