Page:The Fruit of the Tree (Wharton 1907).djvu/240

Rh opportunities? She knew there were girls who sought, by what is called a “good” marriage, an escape into the outer world of doing and thinking—utilizing an empty brain and full pocket as the key to these envied ﬁelds. Some such chance the life at Lynbrook seemed likely enough to offer—one is not, at Justine’s age and with her penetration, any more blind to the poise of one’s head than to the turn of one’s ideas; but here the subtler obstacles of taste and pride intervened. Not even Bessy’s transparent manœuvrings, her tender solicitude for her friend’s happiness, could for a moment weaken Justine’s resistance. If she must marry without love—and this was growing conceivable to her—she must at least merge her craving for personal happiness in some view of life in harmony with hers.

A tap on her door interrupted these musings, to one aspect of which Bessy Amherst’s entrance seemed suddenly to give visible expression.

“Why did you run off, Justine? You promised to be down-stairs when I came back from tennis.”

“Till you came back—wasn’t it, dear?” Justine corrected with a smile, pushing her arm-chair forward as Bessy continued to linger irresolutely in the doorway. “I saw that there was a fresh supply of tea in the drawing-room, and I knew you would be there before the omnibus came from the station.” [ 224 ]