"I long ago made up my mind never to marry at all," Barbara said, with a bored air. Julia chuckled. "It is so funny to hear you go at each other," she explained. "It sounds so cross--and it really isn't at all! Don't worry, Miss Toland," she added soothingly, "Miss Sally wouldn't marry him if she didn't love him--" "Oh, she loves him fast enough!" Barbara admitted, consoled. "And if people love each other, it's all right," Julia went on. Barbara sighed. "Oh, I hope it is, Julia!" said she, as conscious of the little familiarity for all her abstracted air as Julia was, and suspecting that it thrilled Julia, as indeed it did. "And it's all the result of idleness, that's what it is, and that's what I've been telling your mother," said Miss Toland, coming in. "You've all got nothing to do except sit about and think how bored you are!" "Oh, Auntie, aren't you low?" Barbara said tranquilly, going to take an arm of her chair. "All sorts of people elope--there's nothing so disgraceful in _that_." "It's disgraceful considering what a father you've got, and what a mother!" Miss Toland said vexatiously. "And Ted worrying your father to death about that scamp, too! I declare it's too much!" "He's a pretty rich scamp, and a pretty attractive scamp," Barbara said in defence of Theodora's choice. "He's not like that _kid_ of a Keith!" Julia heard the garden gate slam, and a quick, springing step on the porch before the others did, but it was Jane who said, "Here's Jim!" and Barbara who went to let him in. "Oh, Jimmy, have you heard of Sally?" she faltered, and as they came in from the hall Julia's quick eye saw that she was half clinging to his shoulder, sister fashion, and that his arm was half about her. "Hello, every one!" said his big, reassuring voice. "How's Mother? Hello, Aunt Sanna--and Miss Page, too! Well, this is fun, isn't it? Yes, Miss Babbie, I've heard of Sally, Sally Borroughs, as she is now--" "What! Married?" said every one at once, and Mrs. Toland, making an impressive entrance with Richie, sank into a deep chair and echoed: "Married?" "Married, Mother dear," said Jim. "They found me in Dad's office at five o'clock; Keith's father, a fierce sort of man, was with them, and was for calling the whole thing off. Sally was crying, poor girl, and Keith miserable--" "Oh, poor old Sally!" said Barbara's tender voice. "You should have brought her straight home to me!" Mrs. Toland added severely. "Well, so I thought at first. But they had their license, which would be in the morning papers anyway, and Sally had done the fool thing of mailing letters to two girl friends when she left here this morning--" "She left me a mere scribble, pinned to her pin-cushion," said her mother, magnificently. "Just as any common actress--" "Oh, Mother! it wasn't pinned to her cushion at all!" Barbara protested. "She had no pincushion, she has a pin tray."