"Jock," said his mother, still patting her hair, "perhaps you don't
know it, but you're pouting just as you used to when you wore
pinafores. I always hated pouting children. I'd rather hear them howl.
I used to spank you for it. I have prided myself on being a modern
mother, but I want to mention, in passing, that I'm still in a
position to enforce that ordinance against pouting." She turned around
abruptly. "Jock, tell me, how did you happen to come here a day ahead
of me, and how do you happen to be so chummy with that pretty, weak-
faced little thing at the veiling counter, and how, in the name of all
that's unbelievable, have you managed to become a grown-up in the last
few months?"

Jock regarded the mercifully faded roses in the carpet. His lower lip
came forward again.

"Oh, a fellow can't always be tied to his mother's apron strings. I
like to have a little fling myself. I know a lot of fellows here. They
are frat brothers. And anyway, I needed some new clothes."

For one long moment Emma McChesney stared, in silence. Then: "Of
course," she began, slowly, "I knew you were seventeen years old. I've
even bragged about it. I've done more than that--I've gloried in it.
But somehow, whenever I thought of you in my heart--and that was a
great deal of the time it was as though you still were a little tyke
in knee-pants, with your cap on the back of your head, and a chunk of
apple bulging your cheek. Jock, I've been earning close to six
thousand a year since I put in that side line of garters. Just how
much spending money have I been providing you with?"