"So!" Mrs. Binswanger let fall idle hands into her lap. "So!"

"Sure. Didn't you know that, mamma? She was going over for just ten
weeks with her mother and father to take a few singing-lessons when they
got to Paris, just like I want to, and right on the ship going over she
met him and they got engaged."

"So!"

"Yes, mamma."

Mr. Binswanger fell into the attitude of reading again, knees crossed
and one carpet slipper dangling. "I know plenty girls as get engaged on
dry land, Carrie; just get such ideas that they don't out of your head."

"I don't say, Simon, I don't give you right, but after a winter like I
been through I feel like maybe it's better to go as to stay."

"That's right, ma, loosen up and she'll get you yet."

"It ain't nice, Izzy, you should use such talk to your mother. I tell
you it ain't so nice a son should tell his mother she should loosen up."

"I only meant, ma--"

"That's just how I feel, Simon, with the summer coming on I can't stand
no more long faces. Last year it was Arverne till a cottage we had to
take. Always in April already my troubles for the summer begin. One year
Miriam wants Arverne and Ray wants we should go to the mountains where
the Schimm girls go. This year, since she got in with them Lillianthal