It was inevitable that Mrs. Wayne should turn to Mr. Lanley.
“You, too, think it unsuitable?”
He bowed gravely.
“You dislike my son?”
“Quite the contrary.”
“Then you must be able to tell me the reason.”
“I will try,” he said. He felt like a soldier called upon to defend a lost cause. It was his cause, he couldn’t desert it. His daughter and his granddaughter needed his protection; but he knew he was giving up something that he valued more than his life as he began to speak. “We feel the difference in background,” he said, “of early traditions, of judging life from the same point of view. Such differences can be overcome by time and money—” He stopped, for she was looking at him with the same wondering interest, devoid of anger, with which he had seen her study Wilsey. “I express myself badly,” he murmured.
Mrs. Wayne rose to her feet.
“The trouble isn’t with your expression,” she said.
“You mean that what I am trying to express is wrong?”