'I would advise you to go over to the Crescent to-night and see Gladys, and tell her what you have heard. Let her understand—as gently and nicely as you can, but be quite firm over it—that you, as her future husband, have some right to express an opinion about the people she makes friends of. You can lay stress on her own youth and ignorance, and don't be dictatorial. Do you understand me?'
'Yes, but it won't be an easy task,' he said gloomily.
'No, but it's your only chance—a very forlorn hope, I confess, it appears to me; but you can't afford to neglect it if you want to win Gladys, and it would be a most desirable marriage.'
These words were the keynote to Mrs. Fordyce's plan of action. To secure Gladys as a daughter-in-law at any price was her aim, and she had already stifled her womanly indignation over her son's fall, and even comforted herself by the cheap reflection that George had never been half so fast as dozens of other young men who were received into the best society. She had worshipped at the shrine of wealth and social position so long that all her views of life were centred upon a solitary goal, and consequently ran in a narrow and distorted groove.
'If the girl can be prevented going down to Bourhill, all may be well. Do you think she is one likely to hold her tongue?'
'I don't know anything about her. She'll speak, just as other women speak, when it comes up her own back, I suppose. The chances are, if Gladys and she have met, she's told the whole story already.'
'Oh no, she hasn't, because Gladys knew your aunt was coming here this afternoon, and sent a message that you might come over after dinner. She wouldn't have done that if she'd known that pretty story. You'd better go away to the Crescent at once.'
'I'm not very fond of the job,' said George, fortifying himself with a glass of whisky and water. 'I've a good mind to throw the whole bally thing up, and go off to the Antipodes. Marrying is an awful bore, anyhow; women are such a confounded nuisance.'
His mother listened to these lofty sentiments in silence, though she inwardly felt that it would relieve her feelings considerably to administer a sound box in the ear.
'I'm trying to help you, George, against my better judgment, but you don't appear to be very grateful,' she said severely. 'I've a good mind to let you bear the brunt of your folly, as you deserve; and you know very well that if your father knew about it, his anger would be terrific. I'm afraid you'd have to take to the Antipodes then, because the door would be shut upon you here. I would advise you to do what you can to redeem yourself, and your utmost to keep Gladys. Tell me something about the girl. Do you think she would accept a sum of money to leave Glasgow and hold her tongue?'