She had invariably gained her point; and she had gained it with few words, without temper or agitation, by sheer force of character.

If she had been a moral principle she could not have moved more relentlessly.
"Mrs.Blair and I used to talk it over when you and Margaret were children," she continued, in the inflexible tone with which she was accustomed to carry her point.

"Even then you were fond of her." He looked at her with a gleam of the tolerant amusement he had caught from his father's expression.

"Can you imagine anything more certain to turn a man against a marriage than the thought that it was arranged for him in his infancy ?" he objected.
"Not if he knew that his mother had set her heart on it ?" She looked hurt but resolute.
"Don't set your heart on it, Mother.

Let me dree my own weird." "My dear boy, it is for your own good.