You could see it. If he wasn't really thirteen to her he wasn't a day older than twenty-five; he was her young grown-up son whose caresses flattered her. "She spoils me, Miss Madden." You could see that it pleased him to sit close to her knees, to have his hand patted and be spoilt. "Nonsense. Now tell me what happened at Underwoods. Is it to be John Corbett or you?" "Corbett says it's to be me." "I'm glad he's had that much sense. Well--and now tell me all about this League of yours." He told her all about it, and she sat very quietly, listening, nodding her proud old head in approval. He talked about it till it was time to go. Then the old lady became agitated. "My dear boy, you mustn't let Kimber drive you too fast down that hill. Fanny, will you tell Kimber to be careful?" Her face trembled with anxiety as she held it to him to be kissed. At that moment he was her child, escaping from her, going out rashly into the dangerous world. "I like going to see Granny," said Fanny as Kimber tucked them up together in the car. "She makes me feel young." "You may very well feel it," said Mr. Waddington. "It's only my mother's white hair, Miss Madden, that makes her look old." "I thought," said Barbara, "she looked ever so much younger"--she was going to say, "than she is"--"than most people's mothers." "You will have noticed," Fanny said, "that my husband is younger than most people." Barbara noticed that he had drawn himself up with an offended air, unnaturally straight. He didn't like it, this discussion about ages. They were running out of the Square when Fanny remembered and cried out, "Oh, stop him, Horatio. We must go back and see if Ralph's coming to dinner." But at the White Hart they were told that Mr. Bevan had "gone to Oxford on his motor-bike" and was not expected to return before ten o'clock. "Sorry, Barbara." "I don't see why you should apologize to Miss Madden, my dear. I've no doubt she can get on very well without him." "She may want something rather more exciting than you and me, sometimes." "I'm quite happy," Barbara said. "Of course you're happy. It isn't everybody who enjoys Ralph Bevan's society. I daresay you're like me; you find him a great hindrance to serious conversation." "That's why _I_ enjoy him," Fanny said. "We'll ask him for to-morrow night." Barbara tucked her chin into the collar of her coat. The car was running down Sheep Street into Lower Wyck. She stared out abstractedly at the eastern valley, the delicate green cornfields and pink fallows, the muffling of dim trees, all washed in the pale eastern blue, rolling out and up to the blue ridge.