CHAPTER XIV.
What Yellow Eyes Saw.
Freda was so quiet as she and Mauney drove along the river road and so unusually unresponsive to his remarks, that he began to wonder if he had discovered her in another of her unpredictable moods. For some time he, too, was silent.
“Well, Freda,” he said at length, with forced cheerfulness, “suppose we both loosen up for a change. That musicale was pretty nearly too much for me, and I suppose it affected you in the same way. These last two weeks have been about the least satisfactory passage in my life, so far, and if I were to give in to my feelings I would be a rare study in despondency.”
“Lockwood blues!” said Freda, dismally, as she slowly stopped the car by the side of the road. “It’s bound to get you. However, we’ve got to go on living, and I hear that you’ve been showing some attentions to a married woman.”
“Indeed,” laughed Mauney, good-naturedly, “and who is the favored lady?”
“This isn’t such a laughing matter as it looks, Mauney,” she replied with some severity. “My mother’s wild about it.”
“About what?”
For an instant she tugged at her gloves and removed them. “I wish,” she said, “that I were feeling a little happier than I am. I’ll tell you what it’s all about. You were said to have been seen on the street with Mrs. Poynton, and also leaving her house one evening.”
“Well, that’s true enough,” admitted Mauney as he waited for her to continue.