“Oh with your arm and that sort of thing, yes. But I may have to look to you for something more. I feel as if something were going to happen.”
“That’s exactly what I said to Jasper this morning.”
“And what did he say?”
“He only looked innocent—as if he thought I meant a fog or a storm.”
“Heaven forbid—it isn’t that! I shall never be good-natured again,” Mrs. Nettlepoint went on; “never have a girl put on me that way. You always pay for it—there are always tiresome complications. What I’m afraid of is after we get there. She’ll throw up her engagement; there will be dreadful scenes; I shall be mixed up with them and have to look after her and keep her with me. I shall have to stay there with her till she can be sent back, or even take her up to London. Do you see all that?”
I listened respectfully; after which I observed: “You’re afraid of your son.”
She also had a pause. “It depends on how you mean it.”
“There are things you might say to him—and with your manner; because you have one, you know, when you choose.”
“Very likely, but what’s my manner to his? Besides, I have said everything to him. That is I’ve said the great thing—that he’s making her immensely talked about.”
“And of course in answer to that he has asked you how you know, and you’ve told him you have it from me.”