Page:The Other House (London, William Heinemann, 1896), Volume 1.djvu/154

140 Doctor Ramage made his choice. "Oh, your morality!"

"In doing so," she went on, "I also protect my boy. That's the highest morality I know. I'll see Mr. Vidal out here," she added.

"So as to get rid of him easier?"

"My getting rid of him will depend on what he wants. He must take, after all," Mrs. Beever continued, "his chance of meeting any embarrassment. If he plumps in without feeling his way"

"It's his own affair—I see," the Doctor said. What he saw was that his friend's diplomacy had suffered a slight disturbance. Mr. Vidal was a new element in her reckoning; for if, of old, she had liked and pitied him, he had since dropped out of her problem. Her companion, who timed his pleasures to the minute, indulged in one of his frequent glances at his watch. "I'll put it then to the young man—more gracefully than you do—that you'll receive him in this place."

"I shall be much obliged to you."

"But before I go," Doctor Ramage inquired, "where are all our friends?"