"Mrs. Chris Hamson?" exclaimed Edwin startled. "Oh! Is that affair still on the carpet? ... Cheerful outlook!"
Ingpen pulled his beard.
"Anyhow," said he, "Johnnie's the most reliable of the crew. Charlie's the most agreeable, but Johnnie's the most reliable. I wouldn't like to count much on Tom, and as for Jimmie, well of course----!"
"I always look on Johnnie as a kid. Can't help it."
"There's no law against that, so long as you don't go and blub it out to Mrs. Chris," Ingpen laughed.
"I don't know her."
"You ought to know her. She's an education, my boy."
"I've been having a fair amount of education lately," said Edwin. "Only this afternoon I was practically told that I ought to give up the idea of my new works because it has risks and the Palace Porcelain Co. was risky and Janet hasn't a cent. See the point?"
He was obliged to talk about the affair, because it was heavily on his mind. A week earlier he had persuaded himself that the success of a marriage depended chiefly on the tone employed to each other by the contracting parties. But in the disturbing scene of the afternoon, his tone had come near perfection, and yet marriage presented itself as even more stupendously difficult than ever. Ingpen's answering words salved and strengthened him. The sensation of being comprehended was delicious. Intimacy progressed.
"I say," said Edwin, as they parted. "You'd better not know anything about all this when you come to-night."