Page:A Good Woman (1927).pdf/337

 ain't she, and a funny one too, to be married to a mausoleum like Elmer."

"Now, Jason, it's all patched up between you and Elmer. There's no use beginning all over again."

Naomi and Philip had put on their wraps, and were standing by the door, when Jason suddenly slapped his son on the back. "We've got to get better acquainted, son. You'll like your Pa when you know him better. Nobody can resist him." He winked at Emma, who turned crimson. "Ain't it so, Em. Least of all, the ladies." And then to Philip again, "I'll come and see you in the morning."

Philip turned quickly. "No, I'll come and fetch you myself. You wouldn't find the way."

"I want to see the twins the first thing."

"I'll come for you."

He had resolved that his father was not to come to the stable. He saw that Emma hadn't even told his father that he wasn't living with his wife. The stable had suddenly become to him a kind of temple, a place dedicated to that part of him which had escaped. There were things there which his father wouldn't understand, and could only defile. The stable belonged to him alone. It was apart from all the others—his father, his mother, Naomi, Uncle Elmer and Aunt Mabelle.

Emma was standing before Naomi, holding her coat open, so that she might examine the dress underneath. She was saying, "You must come up some afternoon, Naomi, and I'll help you make the dress right. It hangs all wrong at the back, and it's all bunchy around the armholes, You could make it all right, but, as it is, it's . . . it's sort of funny-looking." 