Page:A fountain sealed by Sedgwick, Anne Douglas.djvu/55

A FOUNTAIN SEALED 49 Imogen in his fairness, clearness, but with a more masculine jut of nose and chin, sharper lines of brow and cheek and lip. And beside Eddy—Jack hardly needed the controlled quiet of Imogen's "There's mama" to identify the figure in black.

She leaned there, high and far, on the deck of the great steamer that loomed above their heads, almost ominous in its gigantic bulk and darkness; she leaned there against the rosy sky, her face intent, searching, bent upon the fluttering, shouting throng beneath; and for Jack, in this first impression of her, before she had yet found Imogen, there was something pathetic in the earnestness of her searching gaze, something that softened the rigors of his disapprobation. But, already, too, he fancied that he caught the expected note of the frivolous in the outline of her fur-lined coat, in the grace of her little hat.

Still she sought, her face pale and grave, while, with an imperceptible movement, the steamer glided forward, and now, as Imogen raised her muff in a long, steady wave, her eyes at last found her daughter and, smiling, smiling eagerly down upon them, she leaned far over the deck to wave her answer. She put her hand on her son's arm, pointing them out to him, and Eddy, also finding them, smiled too, but with his rather cool kindness, raising his hat and giving Jack a recognizing nod. It was then as if he introduced Jack. Jack saw her question, saw him as sent, and her smile went from Imogen to him enveloping him with its mild radiance.

"She is very lovely, your mother, as you say,"