"Well, I certainly hope he doesn't consider it final. I don't. I consider it a silly boy-and-girl piece of sentimental nonsense, and I shall do everything in my power to break it up. I consider that my child's happiness is at stake."
"Yes," said her husband, "so do I." He got up and went round to his wife's chair and put penitent arms about her and comforted her. After all, he could afford to be magnanimous. He was going to win his point in the end, and meanwhile it would be an excellent thing for the youngsters to have Mildred doing everything in her pretty power to break it up. She might just as well, he believed, try to put out the hearth fire with the bellows.
With her daughter she became motherly and admonitory in her official third person. "Mother wants only your happiness; you know that, dear."
"Well, then, there's nothing to worry about," said Honor, comfortably, "for you want me to be happy and I can't be happy unless it's with Jimsy, so you'll have to want me to have Jimsy, Muzzie!"
"Mother wants real happiness for you, Honor, genuine, lasting happiness. That's why she wants you to be sure. And you cannot possibly be sure at your age."
"Yes, I can, Muzzie," said Honor, patiently. "Surer than sure. Why,—haven't I always had Jimsy,—ever since I can remember? Before I can remember? He's part of everything that's ever happened to me. I can't imagine what things would be like without him. I won't imagine it!" Her eyes darkened and her mouth grew taut.
"But you'll promise Mother to keep it a secret? You'll promise me faithfully?"
"Of course, Muzzie, if you want me to, but I can't see what difference it makes. I'll never be any surer than I am now,—and I can't ever know Jimsy any better than I do now. Why"—she laughed—"it isn't as if I had fallen in love at eighteen, with a new person, some one I'd just met, or some one I'd known only a little while, like Carter! If I felt like this about Carter I'd think it was reasonable to 'wait' and be 'sure.'" She was aware of a new expression on her mother's lovely face and interpreted it in her own fashion. "I'm sorry if you don't like our telling Carter, Muzzie. We did it before you asked us not to, you know. He's always with us and I'm sure he'd have found out, anyway." She smiled. "Carter's funny about it. He acts—amused—as if he were years and years older, and we were babies playing in a sand box or making mud pies." It was clear that his amusement amused her, just as her mother's admonition amused her: nothing annoyed or disturbed her,—her serenity was too deep for that. Her fine placidity was lighted now with an inner flame, but she was very quiet about her happiness; she was not very articulate in her joy.
"Mother cannot let you go about unchaperoned with Jimsy, Honor. People would very soon suspect——"
"I don't think they would, Muzzie," said Honor, calmly. "None of the other mothers are so particular, you know. Most of the girls go on walks and rides alone. But we won't, if you'd rather not. Stepper will go with us, or Billy, or Ted."