They had all tried it. They had all been at him; his Uncle Randall and his Aunt Randall, and his mother and his father. For the first time in his life Mr. Ransome was roused to take an interest in his son, to acknowledge him as an adult, capable of formidably adult things. And though they all told him that he was too young to know his own mind, that he was doing foolish, and behaving silly, under the show of disapproval and disparagement it was clear that they respected him, that they realized his manhood, and that he was somehow important to them as he had never been important in his life before. What was more, rage as they would at it, they were impressed by Ranny's firmness, his unalterable and imperturbable determination to marry, and to marry the unknown Violet Usher. And on the main issue they gave way. They owned that it was natural that the boy should want to marry; they saw that he would have to marry some day; and his mother went so far as to say she wanted him to marry and to settle down. What they did not understand, and most certainly did not approve of, what they did their best to talk him out of, was the awful hurry he was in. There wasn't any hurry, they said, there shouldn't be, when he was so young. He couldn't afford to marry now, but he could afford it very well in two years' time. Why, he was only twenty-three, and in two years' time he'd have got his next rise, and he'd have saved more money. "If you'd wait, Ranny," said his mother, "but the two years." And his father and his uncle said he _must_ wait. But Ranny wouldn't. He wouldn't wait six months. No, and he wouldn't wait three months and look about him. He wouldn't have waited three weeks if it hadn't been for the banns. It was no use their talking. They knew it. It had been no use their talking seven years ago, when Ranny had refused to become a Pharmaceutical Chemist, and had given no reasons, because the only reason he could give was that life would be intolerable if spent in the perpetual presence of his father. And he didn't give them any reasons now. Before the Ransomes and the Randalls knew where they were the banns had been put up in Wandsworth Parish Church and in the Parish Church of Elstree, in Hertfordshire, and Violet had been twice to tea. He had looked for opposition down at Elstree, in Hertfordshire, fierce and insurmountable opposition from Mr. Usher, that father who had been so harsh to Violet. It was incredible that Violet's father would allow him to marry her; it was incredible that her mother would allow it. He would just have to marry her in spite of them.