Page:The Awkward Age (New York, Harper and Brothers, 1899).djvu/394

THE AWKWARD AGE "Yes," he mused afresh, "one must trust one's child. Does Van?" he then inquired.

"Does he trust her?"

"Does he know anything of the general figure?"

She hesitated. "Everything. It's high."

"He has told you so?"

Mrs. Brook, supremely impatient now, seemed to demur even to the question. "We ask him even less."

"Then how do we know?"

She was weary of explaining. "Because that's just why he hates it."

There was no end, however, apparently, to what Edward could take. "But hates what?"

"Why, not liking her."

Edward kept his back to the fire and his dead eyes on the cornice and the ceiling. "I shouldn't think it would be so difficult."

"Well, you see it isn't. Mr. Longdon can manage it."

"I don't see what the devil's the matter with her," he coldly continued.

"Ah, that may not prevent—! It's fortunately the source, at any rate, of half Mr. Longdon's interest."

"But what the hell is it?" he drearily demanded.

She faltered a little, but she brought it out. "It's me."

"And what's the matter with 'you'?"

She made, at this, a movement that drew his eyes to her own, and for a moment she dimly smiled at him. "That's the nicest thing you ever said to me. But ever, ever, you know."

"Is it?" She had her hand on his sleeve, and he looked almost awkward.

"Quite the very nicest. Consider that fact well, and, even if you only said it by accident, don't be funny—as you know you sometimes can be—and take it back. It's 384