I don’t suppose I shall survive your father very long, dear. Husbands and wives who’ve been so much to one another as we have don’t often make a very good job of separation. I’m so glad to think that you’ll have Sylvia.
John.
Sylvia’s a good girl, isn’t she?
Mrs. Wharton.
When you were away I was dreadfully anxious on my own account, of course, but I was anxious on hers too. She’s had a very hard time with her mother, and there’s been dreadfully little money, only their pensions; if anything had happened to you, when her mother died she would have had practically nothing. You’ve been engaged so long and she’s not very young any more. It’s not likely that anyone else would have wanted to marry her.
John.
Mother darling, you’re being terribly sentimental now.
Mrs. Wharton.
[With comic indignation.] I’m not, John. You don’t know what it is for a penniless woman to be quite alone in the world when she’s lost her youth.
John.