“A yacht, Miss Watkins,” he said into the ear trumpet, “is a delight that it takes daylight to delight in. If my words sound somewhat mixed, believe me, it is the effect of what is to come casting its shadow before. I speak with understanding and sympathy—you will know all later.”
Aunt Mary smiled sweetly. Sometimes she thought that Mitchell was the nicest of the three—times when she wasn’t talking to Clover or Burnett.
Jack took his aunt out to drive on the afternoon of the intervening day and bought her a blue suit with a red tape around one arm, and some rubbersoled shoes, and a yachting cap and a mackintosh. There was something touching in Aunt Mary’s joyful confidence and anticipation—she having never been cast loose from shore in all her life.
“When do you s’pose we’ll get home?” she asked Jack.
“Oh, some time toward night,” he replied.
She smiled with a trust as colossal as Trusts usually are.
“I’m sure I shall have a good time,” she said. “I always liked to see pictures of waves.”
“You’ll see the real things now, Aunt Mary,” cried her nephew heartily. He was not a bit malicious, possessing a stomach whose equilibrium could not conceive any other anatomical condition.
Janice, however, had doubts, and on the morning of the next day her doubts deepened. She looked from the window and shook her head.
“Feel a fly?” inquired Aunt Mary.