Page:Ann Veronica, a modern love story.djvu/131

 tablecloth. 'My God!' he said, 'I'll go after them and kill him.

I'll go after them and kill him.' For the moment I thought it was a telegram from Gwen."

"But what did father imagine?"

"Of course he imagined! Any one would!  'What has happened, Peter?' I asked.  He was standing up with the telegram crumpled in his hand.  He used a most awful word!  Then he said, 'It's Ann Veronica gone to join her sister!'  'Gone!' I said.  'Gone!' he said. 'Read that,' and threw the telegram at me, so that it went into the tureen.  He swore when I tried to get it out with the ladle, and told me what it said.  Then he sat down again in a chair and said that people who wrote novels ought to be strung up.  It was as much as I could do to prevent him flying out of the house there and then and coming after you.  Never since I was a girl have I seen your father so moved.  'Oh! little Vee!' he cried, 'little Vee!' and put his face between his hands and sat still for a long time before he broke out again."

Ann Veronica had remained standing while her aunt spoke.

"Do you mean, aunt," she asked, "that my father thought I had gone off--with some man?"

"What else COULD he think? Would any one DREAM you would be so mad as to go off alone?"

"After--after what had happened the night before?"

"Oh, why raise up old scores? If you could see him this morning, his poor face as white as a sheet and all cut about with shaving! He was for coming up by the very first train and looking for you, but I said to him, 'Wait for the letters,' and there, sure enough, was yours. He could hardly open the envelope, he trembled