Page:The Awkward Age (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1899).djvu/175

BOOK FOURTH: MR. CASHMORE Vanderbank had jnst hesitated, recalling engagements; which gave Mrs. Brook time to intervene. "Can't you live without him?" she asked of her elder friend.

Vanderbank had looked at her an instant. "I think I can get there late," he then replied to Mr. Longdon.

"I think I can get there early," Mr. Cashmore declared. "Mrs. Grendon must have a box; in fact I know which, and they don't," he jocosely continued to his hostess.

Mrs. Brook, meanwhile, had given Mr. Longdon her hand. "Well, at any rate, the child shall soon come to you. And oh, alone," she insisted; "you needn't make phrases—I know too well what I'm about."

"One hopes really you do," pursued the unquenched Mr. Cashmore. "If that's what one gets by having known your mother!"

"It wouldn't have helped you," Mrs. Brook retorted. "And won't you have to say it's all you were to get?" she pityingly murmured to her other visitor.

He turned to Vanderbank with a strange gasp, and Vanderbank said "Come!"