At noon she appeared in the dining-room of Vine Cottage. Her cheeks
were pasty, ashen, but her eyes burned with insane luster. She
must send an important letter to Sylvia, and it was too late-- She
floundered, catching a chair for support. Would Larimore send the
office boy out with a special delivery stamp?
“I’ll take your letter with me, and post it at the office,” Lary said,
annoyed by the crafty manner that marked his mother’s too frequent
subterfuges.
“I haven’t written it yet. It isn’t the kind I could dash off in a
minute. Sylvia wants me to be in Detroit by Friday noon. I’ll have to
get word--”
“Papa won’t be home until Saturday evening,” her son said sharply.
“You can’t go off without consulting him.”
The word “consulting” was unfortunate. It released a flood of
martyrdom. Lavinia thought she owed a duty to her daughter that must
outweigh any consideration or demand on the part of her husband.
“Let me see my sister’s letter. If there is anything serious, I can
telephone.”
“I didn’t bring it with me. In fact, I accidentally dropped it in the
grate and it was burned before I could get it out.”
“A grate fire in July?”
“I was burning some scraps--and it got mixed with them.”
“You are not going away until papa comes home. It isn’t fair to
him--and if you insist--I shall call Sylvia by long distance.”
Judith averted her eyes. The sight of her mother-in-law’s baffled fury
was more than she could endure. In the end the woman agreed to defer
her trip until Saturday night. She would write Sylvia that she could
not be spared from home.