The Happiest Time of Their Lives | Page 9

was, and, Mr. Lanley named him--named
him slightly wrong, and Farron corrected him.
"I'll get you off," he said.
Adelaide looked up at her husband admiringly. This was the aspect of
him that she loved best. It seemed to her like magic what Vincent could
do. Her father, she thought, took it very calmly. What would have
happened to him if she had not brought Farron into the family to rescue
and protect? The visiting boy, she noticed, was properly impressed. She
saw him give Farron quite a dog-like look as he took his departure. To
Mathilde he only bowed. No arrangements had been made for a future
meeting. Mathilde tried to convey to him in a prolonged look that if he
would wait only five minutes all would be well, that her grandfather
never paid long visits; but the door closed behind him. She became
immediately overwhelmed by the fear, which had an element of desire
in it, too, that her family would fall to discussing him, would question
her as to how long she had known him, and why she liked him, and
what they talked about, and whether she had been expecting a visit,
sitting there in her best dress. Then slowly she took in the fact that they
were going to talk about nothing but Mr. Lanley's arrest. She marveled
at the obtuseness of older people--to have stood at the red-hot center of

youth and love and not even to know it! She drew her shoulders
together, feeling very lonely and strong. As they talked, she allowed
her eyes to rest first on one speaker and then on the other, as if she were
following each word of the discussion. As a matter of fact she was
rehearsing with an inner voice the tone of Wayne's voice when he had
said that he loved her.
Then suddenly she decided that she would be much happier alone in
her own room. She rose, patted her grandfather on the shoulder, and
prepared to escape. He, not wishing to be interrupted at the moment,
patted her hand in return.
"Hello!" he exclaimed. "Hands are cold, my dear."
She caught Farron's cool, black eyes, and surprised herself by
answering:
"Yes; but, then, they always are." This was quite untrue, but every one
was perfectly satisfied with it.
As she left the room Mr. Lanley was saying:
"Yes, I don't want to go to Blackwell's Island. Lovely spot, of course.
My grandfather used to tell me he remembered it when the Blackwell
family still lived there. But I shouldn't care to wear stripes--except for
the pleasure of telling Alberta about it. It would give her a year's
occupation, her suffering over my disgrace, wouldn't it, Adelaide?"
"She'd scold me," said Adelaide, looking beautifully martyred. Then
turning to her husband, she asked. "Will it be very difficult, Vincent,
getting papa off?" She wanted it to be difficult, she wanted him to give
her material out of which she could form a picture of him as a savior;
but he only shook his head and said:
"That young man is in love with Mathilde."
"O Vin! Those children?"

Mr. Lanley pricked up his ears like a terrier.
"In love?" he exclaimed. "And who is he? Not one of the East Sussex
Waynes, I hope. Vulgar people. They always were; began life as
auctioneers in my father's time. Is he one of those, Adelaide?"
"I have no idea who he is, if any one," said Adelaide. "I never saw or
heard of him before this afternoon."
"And may I ask," said her father, "if you intend to let your daughter
become engaged to a young man of whom you know nothing
whatsoever?"
Adelaide looked extremely languid, one of her methods of showing
annoyance.
"Really, Papa," she said, "the fact that he has come once to pay an
afternoon visit to Mathilde does not, it seems to me, make an
engagement inevitable. My child is not absolutely repellent, you know,
and a good many young men come to the house." Then suddenly
remembering that her oracle had already spoken on this subject, she
asked more humbly, "What was it made you say he was in love, Vin?"
"Just an impression," said Farron.
Mr. Lanley had been thinking it over.
"It was not the custom in my day," he began, and then remembering
that this was one of his sister Alberta's favorite openings, he changed
the form of his sentence. "I never allowed you to see stray young
men--"
His daughter interrupted him.
"But I always saw them, Papa. I used to let them come early in the
afternoon before you came in."
In his heart Mr. Lanley doubted that this had been a regular custom, but
he knew it would be unwise to argue the point; so