Page:The Awkward Age (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1899).djvu/123

BOOK THIRD: MR. LONGDON "Ah, we all know that—there has been such a row made about it!" Mitchy said.

"Yes, I've heard of the feeling there is," Nanda replied. "It's supposed to be awful, my knowing Tishy—quite too awful."

Mr. Longdon, with Vanderbank's covert aid, had begun to appear to have pulled himself together, dropping back upon his sofa and giving some attention to his tea. It might have been with the notion of showing himself at ease that he turned, on this, a benevolent smile to the girl. "But what, my dear, is the objection—?"

She looked gravely from him to Vanderbank and to Mitchy and then back again from one of these to the other. "Do you think I ought to say?"

They both laughed, and they both just appeared uncertain, but Vanderbank spoke first. "I don't imagine, Nanda, that you really know."

"No—as a family, you're perfection!" Mitchy broke out. Before the fire again, with his cup, he addressed his hilarity to Mr. Longdon. "I told you a tremendous lot, didn't I? But I didn't tell you about that."

The old man maintained, yet with a certain vagueness, the attitude of amiable inquiry. "About the—a—family?"

"Well," Mitchy smiled, "about its ramifications. This young lady has a tremendous friendship—and, in short, it's all very complicated."

"My dear Nanda," said Vanderbank, "it's all very simple. Don't believe a word of anything of the sort."

He had spoken as with the intention of a large, light optimism; but there was clearly something in the girl that would always make for lucidity. "Do you mean about Carrie Donner? I don't believe it, and at any rate I don't think it's any one's business. I shouldn't have a very high opinion of a person who would give up a friend." She stopped short, with the sense 113