Elmira had told her mother that Lawrence Prescott was coming to see her, and she had immediately leaped to furthest conclusions.

Ann Edwards had not a doubt that Lawrence and Elmira would be married.

She had, when it was once awakened, that highest order of ambition which ignores even the existence of obstacles.
As Elmira's green skirts fluttered out of sight behind some lilac-bushes pluming to the wind with purple blossoms Jerome came in, and his mother turned to him.

"I guess Elmira will do about as well as any of the girls," said she, with her tone of blissful yet half-vindictive triumph.
Jerome looked at her wonderingly.

"Why shouldn't she ?" said he.
Immediately Mrs.Edwards put forth her feminine craft like an involuntary tentacle of protection for her excess of imagination, against the masculine practicality of her son.