There were lights in both drawing-rooms when Stuart let in Gilda and
himself with his latch-key. She let slip her evening wrap; he laid it
on a chair by the console, with his hat and stick.
There were no traces of tears on Gilda’s face, but she was rather
colourless.
“It’s dreadfully late,” she whispered to Stuart; “do you think you
should have brought me?”
“Father knows there was a girl with me as my guest in the Forest. That
ass Anderson--do you remember I introduced him when we walked over to
Fisher-cat Dam? Well, he’s here and he mentioned my being there with a
‘pretty girl.’ That’s why I don’t care to lose any time about it.”
Gilda’s colour came back quickly. “No,” she said, “it’s better not to
delay.”
“I’m sorry I had to tell you,” he said. “I hope it won’t disconcert
you.”
She seemed a trifle surprised that the prospect of meeting his family
under any circumstances should disconcert her.
“They’re really not formidable,” he added, seriously.
She regarded him blankly, suddenly melted into a bewitching smile.
“You’re so sweet,” she murmured, “and so entirely all that you should
be. Take me to your parents and explain me, darling, and I’ll try to be
scared to death.”
He was too nervous himself to notice her adorable but saucy levity.
He glanced into the west drawing-room and saw his mother there alone,
playing solitaire.
“Is it you, Stuart?” she said, busy with her cards. “I thought I heard
your key in the door.”
He took Gilda’s soft hand and went in. When his mother raised her
abstracted eyes she saw them standing before her in an odd, faintly
smiling silence.
“Mother,” he said, “this is Gilda Greenway. I’m madly in love with
her. She has consented to marry me. We haven’t thought much about the
date--in fact, we haven’t talked about it--but if she is willing I
can’t see any use in waiting----”
The flushed astonishment on his mother’s face checked his nervous
eloquence.
His mother arose. The manners of all the Suttons were perfect when they
chose.
She held out a gemmed hand to Gilda. When the girl laid her own on it:
“My child, what is this young man of mine trying to tell me?” asked his
mother.
Under the calm scrutiny the girl’s colour heightened to a lovely tint,
but she smiled.
“He’s trying to say to you that we are very much in love, Mrs. Sutton.
We met this last winter. I’m sure it was love at sight with me.”
She bent her charming head, hesitated:
“We have been spending the evening together. Stuart thought that
perhaps this was the best way----”
“Mother,” said the boy earnestly, “she’s a perfect darling!----”
This is the moment in the lives of two young people when what is said
and done by parents determines the future relations of all concerned.
These children did not know it, but the boy’s mother did. She knew
she could lose her son to this girl by a word or look--lose him in
bitterness which never could be entirely forgotten. Every instinct
in her was antagonistic to this departure from rule-of-thumb, from
immemorial routine, from inherited conformation to convention.
Slowly she looked from her only son to this stranger. The girl was
lovely to look upon.
She started to speak, waited to control her voice--the tremor of sudden
tears in her throat--a throat all a-quiver with the protest of offended
pride--of resentment, revolt indescribable.
But all the time she realised what this moment would mean to her and to
her son, and to their future relationship.
She had her voice under control. She said to Gilda:
“If you love as I do, you understand Stuart’s mother at this moment
better than he can.”
Gilda’s face became beautifully grave.
“I do understand. It wasn’t fair for me to come--I didn’t realise how
unfair, until now----”
She turned impulsively toward her lover, but his mother retained her
hand:
“Don’t go. My son’s guests are welcome.... I think you would be welcome
anyway. And if he is to marry you, this is your proper place, my child.”
Gilda’s eyes became suddenly misty: she averted them, turned her head
slightly:
“It was not the thing to do,” she said. “It was your right to be told,
first--to talk to your son undisturbed. I--I’ve made a rather ghastly
faux pas----”
“_I_ have!” said Stuart. “I dragged you here----”
His eyes fell on his father who, hearing voices, had come from a game
of chess in the other drawing-room.
With Sutton senior was his chess-antagonist, Lady Glyndale, wearing the
complacent expression of the victor.
But when Lady Glyndale’s satisfied gaze encountered Gilda, it altered
radically.
Stuart, nervously retaining command of the situation, or supposing he
commanded it, had already presented his father and Gilda to each other,
and had begun in a determined voice:
“Lady Glyndale, my fiancée, Miss Greenway----” when his affianced
interrupted calmly:
“Lady Glyndale is my aunt, Stuart. And how on earth we’ve managed to
encounter each other here----”
“Are you engaged to be married, Gilda?” demanded Lady Glyndale grimly.
“Yes, I am, Aunt Constance.... If--I am--approved----” She looked at
Sutton senior in a bewildered way--turned to Stuart’s mother with the
naïve, involuntary impulse of a child seeking refuge.
In an overwhelming rush of relief that lady fully retained her aplomb.
“It appears,” she said to Lady Glyndale, “that your niece and my son
have chosen to surprise us.”
She looked at Gilda. The girl went to her, took both her hands,
pressing them convulsively.
“You odd, sweet child,” murmured her lover’s mother. “It’s perfectly
clear to me that this absurd, rattle-headed son of mine is to blame.”
Lady Glyndale, looking at Gilda, said grimly: “So _that’s_ the reason
you have declined to travel with me. Why didn’t you say so?”
The girl’s lips were quivering: “I don’t know, Aunt Constance.... I
seem to be a--a mindless sort----”
“You’ve no monopoly of mindlessness,” said Sutton senior, staring hard
at Sutton junior.
“For heaven’s sake, dad----”
“Yes, for heaven’s sake,” said his father.
There was a silence. Then the boy’s mother drew the girl to her, and
the girl’s red head dropped on her shoulder.
Sutton senior walked over, obviously pulling himself together.
“I’d like to have a look at my own daughter-in-law,” he said to Gilda.
“I’d like to see her smile, once----”
“Don’t bother the child now,” said his wife.
But Gilda lifted her head smiling, with wet lashes, and held out her
hand.
“Good girl,” said Sutton senior, and shook it gravely. And turned and
shook the hand of his only son:
“It’s easy to see she’s much too good for you.”
“Thank you, dad.”
His mother smiled at him. He drew a swift, happy breath, went over to
Lady Glyndale.
That lady was in two minds about this business:
“Your mother and father are charming people,” she said frankly. “I hope
you are.”
The boy laughed: “I hope I am,” he said, “and I’m sure you can be if
you care to, Lady Glyndale.”
“Well,” she said, “I’m not at all sure. It quite depends, you see. Come
and talk to me tomorrow.”
“I shall, indeed,” he said, fervently pressing her half-extended hand.
Then Lady Glyndale went over and resolutely kissed Gilda.
“Don’t you think,” she inquired with some sarcasm, “that you could find
a few moments to talk over matters with me before I sail?”
“Yes, Aunt Constance,” said the girl meekly.
Lady Glyndale took a brief, comprehensive sweep of the situation, the
people, their environment. And into her absolutely British visage came
an expression which seemed to mean: “Most certainly this is America and
nowhere else, because these things never happen anywhere else on earth.”
But aloud she said amiably: “Good night. I’m going to bed.”
The men accompanied her to the lift. She graciously declined further
politeness, got into the lift, started it, and hoisted herself bedward.
Sutton senior and Stuart exchanged an unpremeditated and crushing grip.
“Isn’t Gilda wonderful?” said the boy.
“Absolutely,” replied his father with every symptom of conviction. “So
are you, by the way.”
They laughed. Stuart went back to the west drawing-room. Gilda saw him,
would have stepped back, but his mother retained her by the hand.
To her son she said: “Dear, I’m so glad you’re happy.” And held him
wistfully a moment after they had kissed.
Then, smiling, she kissed Gilda, and went leisurely from the room,
leaving her boy to his new love as must all mothers who bear a
man-child in pain and travail and gratitude to God.
THE END
_Novels by_ ROBERT W. CHAMBERS
THE TALKERS
ERIS
THE FLAMING JEWEL
THE LITTLE RED FOOT
THE SLAYER OF SOULS
THE CRIMSON TIDE
THE LAUGHING GIRL
THE RESTLESS SEX
BARBARIANS
THE DARK STAR
THE GIRL PHILIPPA
WHO GOES THERE!
ATHALIE
THE BUSINESS OF LIFE
THE GAY REBELLION
THE STREETS OF ASCALON
THE COMMON LAW
THE FIGHTING CHANCE
THE YOUNGER SET
THE DANGER MARK
THE FIRING LINE
JAPONETTE
QUICK ACTION
THE ADVENTURES OF A MODEST MAN
ANNE’S BRIDGE
BETWEEN FRIENDS
THE BETTER MAN
POLICE!!!
SOME LADIES IN HASTE
THE TREE OF HEAVEN
THE MOONLIT WAY
IN SECRET
CARDIGAN
THE RECKONING
THE MAID-AT-ARMS
AILSA PAIGE
SPECIAL MESSENGER
THE HAUNTS OF MEN
LORRAINE
MAIDS OF PARADISE
ASHES OF EMPIRE
THE RED REPUBLIC
BLUE-BIRD WEATHER
A YOUNG MAN IN A HURRY
THE GREEN MOUSE
IOLE
THE MYSTERY OF CHOICE
THE CAMBRIC MASK
THE MAKER OF MOONS
THE KING IN YELLOW
IN SEARCH OF THE UNKNOWN
THE TRACER OF LOST PERSONS
THE CONSPIRATORS
A KING AND A FEW DUKES
THE HIDDEN CHILDREN
IN THE QUARTER
OUTSIDERS
Transcriber’s Note:
Punctuation errors have been silently fixed. Archaic forms and minor
inconsistencies in hyphenation and spelling have been retained as
printed.
The list of novels by Robert W. Chambers has been moved to the
end of the book.
New original cover art included with this eBook is granted to the
public domain.
The following changes have been made:
On page 218: current to currant
On page 274: a to are