Page:O Genteel Lady! (1926).pdf/133

 To which there could be no answer. Pauline nervously began to pick up and set down the ivory and jade ornaments on the drawing-room table; her knuckly fingers trembled.

'I had hoped so much from you, Lanice, and now you are ready to leave all and go off with this fast young man in a sleigh.'

'But why not? Of course I'll be back before it is really dark. Surely it is of no consequence.'

She tried to speak lightly, but her voice vibrated. Pauline muttered something about a symbol. The silence in the Poggy drawing-room became ominous. Lanice went to the grate and mended the fire. Pauline hunched over the table like a moulting bird, stopped her exploration of its objets de virtu, and fumbled about her face.

'Lanice,' she said coldly, 'I am in a sense your natural protector. It is my right to know whether you intend matrimony with this young man.'

Instantly realizing that it was not her right and that she was approaching the subject clumsily, she changed her style and swooped over to Lanice, patting one pale hand and murmuring, 'I think I know just what you are going through, my love. Now let us talk things over perfectly calmly and sensibly. Jones is so fascinating. Sometimes men who have sown their wild oats make the steadiest husbands. There, there, I did not mean to upset you.'

'Pauline,' gasped Lanice, 'he's going away next week...England. I don't know whether or not I am supposed to go with him. I know he loves me...'