“Was I staring? Forgive me.”
As she began the piece he lounged in a chair near by. Nevin’s dream, in all its pretty moods, all its imagery! He half-listened. He wanted to think.
The Freeman home was growing comfortable. All its members were, no doubt, off the beaten path. Mauney felt a commendation in their very originality. If the professor chose to spend his time in the desultory travail of mental investigations, was not his occupation as justifiable as the time-wasting hobbies of most men? If Mrs. Freeman wished to limit her mind, as she apparently did, to devotional pursuits, was this any more to be criticized than the asininity of bridge-parties and the hypocritical commitments of woman’s average social life? And if, finally, Lorna chose to be so uncomfortably frank as to inform him how little she relished eaves-dropping over a banister, was her frankness not, in reality, part of a truthful, clean-cut personality, that admitted no deception? The home was growing comfortable.
But he did not know what he wanted to say to Lorna. Their conversation roamed aimlessly and pleasantly along accustomed paths. He found himself admiring her queenly face and groping for words. After an hour the professor’s soft step was heard on the stairs. He came in, to find them sitting in separate chairs, five feet apart. He smiled and glanced from one to the other.
“Well, people,” he said, in his quiet voice, “what is the big topic of discussion to-night?”
“We haven’t struck one yet, sir,” Mauney replied. “We’ve been avoiding controversial subjects.”
“Would you like some tea?” Freeman asked.
This was the historian’s failing—tea at night, hot, weak and in quantities, before he retired to the midnight vigil of his more serious study. Lorna led the way to the dining-room and made it. Holding their cups and saucers they stood talking about art for art’s sake. This was introduced by a still-life group in oils, hung over the sideboard, and completed, at length, by an appeal to the professor, who stated that, without any shadow of doubt, art had no higher aim than art. But while he talked he looked from one to the other, as if, in the undercurrents of his brain, he was attempting to decide how intimate a relationship existed between them, and as if, so Mauney felt, he himself would be the greatest obstacle to any suitor for his daughter’s hand.
Later Lorna bade Mauney good-night in the vestibule, between the hall-door and the street-door. Some sense of being closeted from the world stole upon him and with it a desire to take Lorna passionately in his arms. With an effort he checked the impulse.
“Lorna,” he said, “do you know that I nearly kissed you. What would you have done?” He still held her hand.