They have a most agreeable chat until Mr. Grandon comes in, when Denise sends up some tea and wafer biscuits that would tempt an anchorite. The carriage is at the door for Gertrude, and an urgent note for Floyd, who has been deep in business all the afternoon, making up Eugene's shortcomings.
"You must go," Violet says, but it is half questioningly.
"Yes. Gertrude, I shall be very glad to have you keep me in countenance. We will discourse cynically upon the follies of the day and young people in general."
"No," Violet says, with pretty peremptoriness. "Gertrude is going to be young to-night. Oh, what will you wear?"
"There is nothing but black silk," answers Gertrude, "and that never was especially becoming, as I can indulge in no accessories. But Laura's dress is perfection. The palest, loveliest pink you can imagine, and no end of lace. Luckily, Mr. Delancy has not his fortune to make."
Floyd kisses his wife tenderly and whispers some hurried words of comfort. When they are gone the professor drops into his own luxurious chair and does not allow Mrs. Grandon time for despondency. He has an Old World charm; he has, too, the other charm of a young and fresh heart when he is not digging into antiquities.
Some way the talk comes around to Gertrude. She is so delicate, so melancholy, she shrinks so away from all the happy confusion that most women love. "Is it her grief for her father?" he asks.
"I don't think it all that," says Violet, with a most beguiling flush. "There was another sorrow in her life, a—she loved some one very much. If he had died it would not have been as bad, but—oh, I wonder if I ought to tell?" and she finds so much encouragement in his eyes that she goes on. "He was—very unworthy."
"Ah!" The professor strokes and fondles his long, sunny beard. "But she should cast him out, she should not keep pale and thin, and in ill health, and brood over the trouble."
"I do not believe her life is—well, you see they all have other pursuits and are fond of society, and she stays too much alone," explains Violet, with a perplexed brow. "She is so good to me, I like her."