AN UNDERSTANDING
Mrs. Harmon was very petulant; indeed, her aspect in one of lower
station would have been deemed sulky. Reviewing the afternoon, she was
convinced that to have brought Ellis there was a great mistake. Why
should she take up with him, anyway? He could give her nothing
but--trinkets; the old acquaintance was not so close that she was bound
to help him. It had been condescension on her part; she might as well
stop it now; yes, she might as well.
Yet she thought with some uneasiness of those trinkets. To accept them
had not bound her to him, had it? Their money value was nothing to him.
She could break from him gradually--that would be simple enough--and she
could make a beginning on the drive home, for silence could show her
feelings.
Ellis understood her after one glance, which expressed not only his
impatience with her instability, but also a sudden new repulsion. The
afternoon had opened his eyes to what the finer women were. How could he
have supposed that Mrs. Harmon was really in the inner circle? How she
contrasted with Judith! She seemed so flat beside the girl; she was his
own kind, while Judith was better. He wished that he might drop the
woman and pin his hopes to the girl.
But he could not spare Mrs. Harmon, and he had no fear that she would
drop him, for he knew all her weaknesses. She was ambitious to a certain
degree, but after that, lazy; she was fond of comfort, fond
of--trinkets, with a healthy indifference to ways and means. In fact,
although Ellis did not so phrase it, there was a barbaric strain in her,
a yearning for flesh-pots and show, in which her husband's tastes and
means did not permit her to indulge herself. Ellis knew that he could
manage her.
"Lydia," he said, "I want to thank you for the afternoon. It must have
been a great bother to you. I'm afraid I spoiled your fun."
She could but respond. "Oh, not much."
"Look here," he went on. "You know me, I think; we understand each other
pretty well. These people," and he waved his hand to include the whole
golf club, "are not to be too much for us. Do you mind my saying a few
words about myself?"
"Oh, no!" she exclaimed with involuntary interest; for he seldom spoke
his thoughts.
"That girl, Miss Blanchard," he said, "was very good to me."
"She was?" Mrs. Harmon could not subdue an accent of surprise, but
hastened to explain. "I've sometimes found her haughty."
"I shan't forget you introduced me to her," said Ellis. "I mean to
follow up my acquaintance there."
"No girl," suggested Mrs. Harmon, "has much influence. No unmarried
woman, I mean."
"But when Miss Blanchard marries she will have it then?"
"Yes," answered Mrs. Harmon thoughtfully, and then very positively:
"Yes, I think she would be a leader of the younger set."
"I am sure she would." Ellis nodded confidently. Judith had faults,
notably rashness, but under wise guidance she could develop masterly
qualities.
"But why----" began Mrs. Harmon in some perplexity. Then she caught
sight of her companion's expression. "What! you don't mean to say that
you--you would?"
"Why not?" asked Ellis. "Is it so very strange?"
"You are over forty!" cried Mrs. Harmon.
"Nothing to do with the case," he replied shortly.
"N-no," agreed Mrs. Harmon slowly. "No, I believe not--not with Judith."
She looked at her companion with sudden respect. "I believe you've hit
upon it! I didn't know you thought of anything of the kind."
"I need you, just the same," said Ellis. "You will help me?"
"Yes, yes," she replied. She felt a nervous inclination to giggle. "It's
a big affair."
"All the more credit if you engineer it," he answered, and shrewdly, for
she felt stimulated. If _she_ could engineer it! Then she could plume
herself in the face of Mrs. Fenno, and would always have a strong ally
in Judith.
"Yes," she cried eagerly, "it will mean a great deal to--to everybody if
it happens. Why, I could----"
But Ellis would not let her run on. "Do you know her well?" he
interrupted.
"I will know her better soon," she stated.
"Not too quick," he warned, fearing that she might blunder. "You know
yourself that she is not a girl to be hurried. Tell me, now, what men
are there of her family?"
"Only her father."
"And what sort of man is he?"
Mrs. Harmon's vocabulary was not wide. "Why, spreading," she explained.
"Jaunty, you know."
"And his circumstances?"
"He is well off," she answered. "Keeps a carriage and spends freely.
There was money in the family, and his wife had some too. You know how
those old fortunes grow."
Or disappear, thought Ellis; he had been investigating the Colonel's
standing. "Miss Blanchard has no cousins?" he asked aloud. "No other men
attached to her?"
"Attached in one sense," she replied, "but not connected."
"Much obliged," he said. "Now, Lydia, if we stand by each other----"
Mrs. Harmon had forgotten her earlier thoughts. "Of course!" she cried.
"Oh, it will be so interesting!"
Ellis added the finishing touch, abruptly changing the subject. "You
have been to Price's recently?"
Now Price was the fashionable jeweller, and few women were indifferent
to his name. Mrs. Harmon, recollecting the cause of her recent visit
there, saw fit to be coy.
"Oh, yes," she said, turning her head away. "He keeps asking me to
come."
"He's always picking up pretty things," said Ellis approvingly. "Did he
have anything special this time?"
"Something of Orsini's," replied Mrs. Harmon, struggling to appear
indifferent. For they had been lovely, those baroque pearls so
gracefully set in dusky gold. Price had made her try the necklace on,
and she had sighed before the glass. "I wish he wouldn't pester me so,"
she said irritably. "He knows I can't afford them."
"He knows you have taste," Ellis said warmly. "He calls it a great
pleasure to show things to you."
"I know," she replied, mollified. "I think he means to flatter me. But,
Stephen, it's getting late, and I must dress for the Fennos' ball this
evening."
"Then," responded Ellis, "I will stop at Price's on my way down-town."
"Naughty! naughty!" she answered, but she radiated smiles.
Ellis, after he had left Mrs. Harmon at her door, went, as he had
promised, to the establishment of the pushing Mr. Price, and asked for
the proprietor.
"Got anything to show me?" Ellis demanded.
From his safe the jeweller brought out a leather case, and looked at
Ellis impressively before opening it.
"Pretty small," commented Ellis.
"Ah, but----" replied the other, and opened the case. "Look--Orsini's
make!"
"I don't know anything about that," Ellis said as he poked the jewels
with his finger. "Look strange to me. The fashion, however?"
"The very latest," Price assured him. "Trust me, Mr. Ellis."
It was one secret of Ellis's success that he knew where to trust. He had
ventured twice that day, with women at that, and the thought of it was
to trouble him before he slept. But he could trust Price in matters of
taste, and as to secrecy, the man was bound to him. Price had been in
politics at the time when Ellis was getting "influence" in the city
government; for the jeweller those days were past, but this store and
certain blocks of stock were the result. Besides, he was adroit. Ellis
gave the chains and pendants a final push with his finger.
"Send it, then," he said. "The usual place. By the way, how much? Whew!
some things come dear, don't they? But send it, just the same, and at
once. She's going out to some affair."
Thus it happened that Mrs. Harmon wore "the very latest" at her throat
that night.