"Oh, I can't do anything about this marriage," she said, with a gesture of indifference; "but that's not the important thing."
"Not important? What do you mean?"
"I mean that the important thing is to know what made Blair behave in this way; and then cure him."
"Cure him! There's no cure for rottenness." He was so beside himself with pain that he forgot that she was a woman, and Blair's mother.
"I blame myself for Blair's conduct," she said.
"Oh, Elizabeth is as bad as he is!" But he waited for her contradiction.
It did not come. "Probably worse." Involuntarily he raised a protesting hand.
"But I mean to forgive her," said Sarah Maitland, with cold determination.
"Forgive Elizabeth?" he said, angrily, and his anger was the very small end of the wedge of his own forgiveness; "forgive her? It strikes me the boot is on the other leg, Mrs. Maitland."
"Oh, well," she said, "what difference does it make? I guess it's a case of the pot and the kettle. I'm not blaming your girl overmuch; although a bad woman is always worse than a bad man. In this case, Elizabeth acted from hate, and Blair from love; the result is the same, of course, but one motive is worse than the other. But never mind that—Blair has got her, and he will be faithful to her; for a while, anyhow. And Elizabeth will get used to him—that's Nature, and Nature is bigger than a girl's first fancy. So if David doesn't interfere—you think he won't? you don't know human nature, Friend Ferguson! David isn't a saint—at least I hope he isn't; I don't care much about twenty-seven-year-old male saints. David may not be able to interfere, but he'll try to, somehow. You wait! As for Blair, as I say, if David doesn't put his finger in the pie, Blair isn't hopeless."