III
As they drove to Shepherd’s for dinner he good-naturedly combated Constance’s assertion that Confucius was as great a teacher as Christ. Leila said she’d like to adopt a Chinese baby; the Chinese babies in the movies were always so cute. Shepherd’s philanthropic nature had been deeply impressed by the idea of reducing human suffering through foreign missions. He announced that he would send the bishop a check.
“Well, I claim it was a good sermon,” said Leila. “That funny old bird talked a hundred berries out of Dada.”
When they reached the table, Mills reproved Leila for asserting that she guessed she was a Buddhist. She confessed under direct examination that she knew nothing about Buddhism but thought it might be worth taking up sometime.
“Millie says there’s nothing in the Bible so wonderful as the world itself,” Leila continued. “Millie has marvelous ideas. Talk about miracles—she says the grass and the sunrise are miracles.”
“Millie is such a dear,” Constance murmured in a tone that implied a lack of enthusiasm for grass and sunrises.
“Millicent has a poetic nature,” Mills remarked, finding himself self-conscious at the mention of Millicent. Millicent’s belief in a Supreme Power that controls the circling planets and guides the destinies of man was interesting because Millicent held it and talked of it charmingly.
“Did you see that outlandish hat Mrs. Charlie Felton was sporting?” Leila demanded with cheerful irrelevance. “I’ll say it’s some hat! She ought to hire a blind woman to buy her clothes.”
“I didn’t see anything the matter with her hat,” remarked Shepherd.
“You wouldn’t, dear!” said Constance.
“Who’s Charlie Felton?” asked Mills. “It seemed to me I didn’t know a dozen people in church this morning.”
“Oh, the Feltons have lately moved here from Racine, Fond du Lac or St. Louis—one of those queer Illinois towns.”
“Those towns may be queer,” said her father gently. “But they are not in Illinois.”
“Oh, well, give them to Kansas, then,” said Leila, who was never disturbed by her errors in geography or any other department of knowledge. “You know,” she continued, glad the conversation had been successfully diverted from religion, “that Freddy Thomas was in college with Charlie Felton and Freddy says Mrs. Felton isn’t as bad as her hats.”
Mills frowned. Shepherd laughed at this more joyously than the remark deserved and stammeringly tried to cover up the allusion to Thomas. It was sheer impudence for Leila to introduce into the Sunday table talk a name that could only irritate her father; but before Shepherd could make himself articulate Mills looked up from his salad.
“Freddy? I didn’t know you were so intimate with anyone of that name.”
This was not, of course, strictly true. Leila always referred to Thomas as Freddy; she found a mischievous delight in doing so before her father. Since she became aware of her father’s increasing displeasure at Thomas’s attentions and knew that the young man’s visits at the house were a source of irritation, she had been meeting Thomas at the homes of one or another of her friends whose discretion could be relied on, or at the public library or the Art Institute—it was a joke that Leila should have availed herself of these institutions for any purpose! Constance in giving her an admonitory prod under the table inadvertently brushed her father-in-law’s shin.
“I meant Mr. Frederick Thomas, Dada,” Leila replied, her gentle tone in itself a species of impudence.
“I hope you are about done with that fellow,” said Mills, frowning.
“Sure, Dada, I’m about through with him,” she replied with intentional equivocation.
“I should think you would be! I don’t like the idea of your name being associated with his!”
“Well, it isn’t, is it?”
Mills disliked being talked back to. His annoyance was increased by the fact that he had been unable to learn anything detrimental to Thomas beyond the fact that the man had been divorced. The decree of divorce, he had learned in Chicago, was granted to Thomas though his wife had brought the suit. While not rich, Thomas was well-to-do, and when it came to the question of age, Arthur Carroll was a trifle older. But Leila should marry Carroll. Carroll was ideally qualified to enter the family by reason of his familiarity with its history and traditional conservatism. He knew and respected the Franklin Mills habit of mind, and this in itself was an asset. Mills had no intention of being thwarted in his purpose to possess Carroll as a son-in-law....
Gloom settled over the table. Mills, deeply preoccupied, ate his dessert in silence. Leila presented a much more serious and pressing problem than foreign missions. Constance strove vainly to dispel the cloud. Leila alone seemed untroubled; she repeated a story that Bud Henderson had told her which was hardly an appropriate addendum for a missionary sermon. Her father rebuked her sternly. If there was anything that roused his ire it was a risqué story.
“One might think,” he said severely, “that you were brought up in a slum from the way you talk. The heathen are not all in China!”
“Well, it is a funny story,” Leila persisted. “I told it to Doctor Harden and he almost died laffin’. Doc certainly knows a joke. You’re not angry—not really, terribly angry at your ’ittle baby girl, is ’ou, Dada?”
“I most certainly am!” he retorted grimly. A moment later he added: “Well, let’s go to Deer Trail for supper. Connie, you and Shep are free for the evening, I hope?”
“We’ll be glad to go, of course,” Constance replied amiably.