“Already?” She yawned a bit, but strangely was not sleepy. Sudden memory of her determination came to her. “Well, then, I’m going to get up and dress the babies as long as I scared them out of their sleep. I’ll start them with their breakfast, then I want to have a talk with you, Hugh.”
Hugh groaned with mock seriousness.
“Can’t a fellow even go to the big town to make a million dollars without having to carry a lot of samples to match or have to bring home an aluminum pan or something?”
But there was no answering light of humor from his wife. How little Hugh knew how serious had been their talk of the night before, she thought as she deftly swung little Elinor around to fasten her tiny rompers. Well, he would know before he left that she was not going to let him have his own way without a word from her.
As a usual thing Hugh’s not over-melodious whistling as he shaved and dressed was a pleasure to her. She thought of him as a big boy, a grown-up edition of her own small Howard, and it was with an indulgent smile that she would listen to him as she hurried the children with their breakfasts while his coffee was being prepared and the little table set for their own breakfast. This morning, however, it had a strangely disturbing effect. Somehow she wished he wouldn’t do it. He sounded so—well, so overconfident. Of course, she was glad if he felt confident of the success of his mission in New York, but he shouldn’t be planning, as she knew he was, to spend their money as he had proposed the night before.
But Hugh was so full of his plans for selling his invention, so eager in his hurried talk, that he never noticed her attitude, her unusual silence as she opened his eggs, spilling them a little as her hand trembled with the indignation that she had nursed through the night. He hurried through the last mouthful, rose and started to put on his overcoat.
“Got to hurry a little in spite of our early start, honey,” he observed, glancing at his watch. “Hurry up with your orders for the head of the house.”
Still Marjorie Benton was silent until she had followed her husband from the kitchen out onto the little porch and closed the door behind her.
“Hugh,” she began, and there was firmness and determination in her tone and in the set of her daintily-molded young chin. “I’m sorry to have to say this, but I can’t let you go off to New York until we come to a decision about the matter of which we spoke last night.”
“What matter?” For the minute, his mind far away on what he intended to do, the master of the house of Benton had forgotten the talk which had come to mean so much to his wife. Then a light dawned on him, and he grinned. “Oh, yes, I remember,” and his light laugh only further annoyed Marjorie, “we spent several million dollars in several different ways, didn’t we?”