Mabel sat up with a little scream.
“Next week—this week—to-morrow!” she repeated. “Why, Joe dear, we can’t!”
“Why can’t we?” asked Joe with masculine directness.
“Why—why—we just can’t,” replied Mabel. “I haven’t got my wedding clothes ready. And I’ll have to be married in my own home. What would my family think? What would my friends think? It would look like a runaway affair. People would talk. Oh, Joe dear, I’d love to, but I just can’t. Don’t you see I can’t?”
Joe did not see at all, and he renewed his importunities with all his powers of persuasion. But Mabel, though she softened her refusal with lover-like endearments, was set in her convictions, and Joe at last was forced to confess in his heart with a groan that his mother was right, and that he had a lot to learn about women.
He suggested in desperation that they go on at once to her home in Goldsboro and be married there, but although that would have taken away one of her arguments, the others still continued in full force, and she added another for good measure.
“You see, Joe, dear, your mother isn’t well enough just now to travel so far, and it would break her heart if she weren’t present at our marriage. By fall she may be better.”
“By fall!” echoed Joe in dismay. “Have I got to wait that long?”
“I think it would be better, dear,” said Mabel gently. “You see if we got married any time after the baseball season had commenced, you would find it hard to get away from your club. In any case, our honeymoon trip would have to be very short. Then, too, if I traveled about the circuit with you, you’d have me on your mind, and it might affect your playing. But I promise you that we shall get married in the fall, just as soon as the baseball season is over.”
And as she sealed this promise in the way that Joe liked best, he was forced to be content.