I nodded a non-committal head. It all seemed rather mad. Betty rose and from her graceful height gazed down on me.
"If you don't look more cheerful, Major, I shall cry. I've never done so yet, but I'm sure I've got it in me."
I stretched out my hand. She took it, and, still holding it, seated herself on a footstool close to my chair.
"There are such a lot of things that occur to me," I said. "Things that your poor mother, if she were alive, would be more fitted to touch on than myself."
"Such as—"
She knelt by me and gave me both her hands. It was a pretty way she had. She had begun it soon after her head overtopped mine in my eternal wheelbarrow. There was a little mockery in her eyes.
"Well—" said I. "You know what marriage means. There is the question of children."
She broke into frank laughter.
"My darling Majy—" That is the penalty one pays for admitting irresponsible modern young people into one's intimacy. They miscall one abominably. I thought she had outgrown this childish, though affectionate appellation of disrespect. "My darling Majy!" she said. "Children! How many do you think I'm going to have?"
I was taken aback. There was this pure, proud, laughing young face a foot away from me. I said in desperation:—