"Besides," digressed my mother, leaving this obscure point unsettled, "what reason have you got to think you'll ever get along agreeably with his folks?"
"I'd get along with Choctaw Indians," quoth I, "if it would make him any happier; besides, I won't have to—they're all in Scotland."
"Whose happiness do you mean?" enquired my mother, though she knew right well.
"Why, his—Mr. Laird's, of course."
"Are you going to call him Mr. Laird?" pursued my mother, for womanly curiosity will show itself even amid high tragedy.
"I reckon so—I don't know," and I laughed as I spoke; "that never occurred to me."
"He didn't ask you to—to call him Gordon?"
"Mercy, no—why should he?" I exclaimed aghast.
"Why shouldn't he?" replied my mother. "I remember the night your father asked me to marry him—but then, there's no use of that; that's all over now. When is he going to speak to me about it, Helen?"
"Oh, mother," I said, putting my arms about her neck, "you're such a woman! I know you're just counting the minutes till you'll be alone with him when he's pleading with you to give your daughter to him. That's the next best thing to getting a proposal yourself, isn't it, mother?"