Page:The Plutocrat (1927).pdf/103

 ble from his chair; but discerned no glint of burnished gold enhelmed above the scrolled wrought-iron railing.

Tinker addressed him. "Fine morning we've had. Mighty nice bright day!" It was notable how his voice betrayed him with its debauched hoarseness; but what repelled the playwright was the commonplace approach of the provincial, the customary "small-town" manner of opening acquaintance through the weather. However, he said, "Very," and looked up again at the balcony.

Tinker coughed and glanced placatively at his wife; but she offered him no more encouragement to go on talking than Ogle did. She sat with downcast, brooding eyes in the manner of a woman who has lately had much to suffer but more to condemn, and, as for returning her husband's plaintive glance, she made it clear that she had no desire to look at anything so leprous.

The daughter's manner was the mother's emphasized, but with something virulent added. Laurence Ogle had the habit of detaching the observing and note-taking part of himself from his emotions and sensations, a sixth sense that students of their fellow-men acquire; and he was conscious of the emanation