Mrs. Vertrees was tremulous. “You mustn't give way so,” she said, inspired for once almost to direct discourse. “Whatever Mary might think of doing, it wouldn't be on her own account; it would be on ours. But if WE should—should consider it, that wouldn't be on OUR own account. It isn't because we think of ourselves.”
“Oh God, no!” he groaned. “Not for us! We can go to the poorhouse, but Mary can't be a stenographer!”
Sighing, Mrs. Vertrees resumed her obliqueness. “Of course,” she murmured, “it all seems very premature, speculating about such things, but I had a queer sort of feeling that she seemed quite interested in this—” She had almost said “in this one,” but checked herself. “In this young man. It's natural, of course; she is always so strong and well, and he is—he seems to be, that is—rather appealing to the—the sympathies.”
“Yes!” he agreed, bitterly. “Precisely. The sympathies!”
“Perhaps,” she faltered, “perhaps you might feel easier if I could have a little talk with some one?”
“With whom?”
“I had thought of—not going about it too brusquely, of course, but perhaps just waiting for his name to be mentioned, if I happened to be talking with somebody that knew the family—and then I might find a chance to say that I was sorry to hear he'd been ill so much, and—Something of that kind perhaps?”
“You don't know anybody that knows the family.”
“Yes. That is—well, in a way, of course, one OF the family. That Mrs. Roscoe Sheridan is not a—that is, she's rather a pleasant-faced little woman, I think, and of course rather ordinary. I think she is interested about—that is, of course, she'd be anxious to be more intimate with Mary, naturally. She's always looking over here from her house; she was looking out the window this afternoon when Mary went out, I noticed—though I don't think Mary saw her. I'm sure she wouldn't think it out of place to—to be frank about matters. She called the other day, and Mary must rather like her—she said that evening that the call had done her good. Don't you think it might be wise?”
“Wise? I don't know. I feel the whole matter is impossible.”