As Mrs. Loring sat there, with her son's letter on her lap, her sister, Mrs. Charles Horton, came out of the house with a novel in her hand and joined her.
"Still brooding over Morry's letter, Grace?" Mrs. Horton asked in a brusque voice, sitting down beside her.
Mrs. Loring withdrew her vague, handsome eyes from the sea, and looked quietly and directly at her sister.
"I'm not brooding, Eleanor," she said gently.
"Well, what then?" asked Mrs. Horton.
Mrs. Loring glanced at the letter through her face-à-main as though consulting it, then said in the same tranquil tone:
"I think I was rather admiring them both."
"What rubbish you talk sometimes, my dear Grace!" exclaimed her sister explosively.
Mrs. Horton was short, brune, and rather plump. She had small, chestnut-brown eyes, and rough, strong, crinkly dark hair. She was in every way the opposite of her tall, distinguished, rather hushed sister. Her manner of thinking and speaking was blunt and straightforward. Mrs. Horton had no half-tones—she was like some effective national flag, all clearly defined blocks of frank, crude colour.
"Are you going to write and remonstrate with that young fool, or are you going to sit by and see him smash his life like crockery?" she said abruptly.