“And did you come down alone?” Vernon went on.
“No, not exactly,” said Miss Greene. “Mrs. Overman Hodge-Lathrop, and, I believe, several—”
“Mrs. Overman Hodge-Lathrop!”
“I think,” said Miss Greene, “that she sits somewhere behind.” There was a twinkle in the eyes she lifted for an instant from her berries.
Vernon scanned the dining-room. There was Mrs. Overman Hodge-Lathrop, in all her—and yes, beside her, sheltered snugly under her all-protecting wing, was Amelia Ansley! They were at a long table, Mrs. Overman Hodge-Lathrop at the head, and with them half a dozen women, severe, and most aggressively respectable. They sat—all of them—erect, pecking at their food with a distrust that was not so much a material caution as a spiritual evidence of their superiority to most of the things with which they were thrust in contact every day. Their hats scarcely trembled, such was the immense propriety of their attitudes; they did not bend at all, even to the cream.
Vernon, who was taking all this in at a glance, saw that Mrs. Overman Hodge-Lathrop was severer than he had ever imagined it possible for women to be—even such a woman as she. He would not have been surprised had he suddenly been told that her name had acquired another hyphen; certainly her dignity had been rehyphenated. There she sat, with her broad shoulders and ample bust, her arms jeopardizing the sleeves of her jacket.
It was the most impressive breakfast table he had ever seen. It might have given him a vision of the future, when he should have secured for women all their civil and political rights, and the nation had progressed to female lieutenant-generals, who would be forced at times to dine in public with their staffs. But he had no such vision, of course; the very spiritual aversion of those women to such a thought would have prevented it, occultly.
In point of fact, his regard in an instant had ceased to be general and had become specific, having Amelia for its objective. She sat on the right of her commander, a rather timid aide; and she seemed spiritually to snuggle more closely under her protecting shadow with each passing moment. She seemed to be half frightened, and had the look of a little girl who is about to cry. Her gray figure, with its hat of violets above her dark hair, was, on the instant, half pathetic to Vernon. She sat facing him, her face downcast.
There was no conversation at that table; it was to be seen at a glance indeed that among those ladies there would be need for none, all things having been prearranged for them. Vernon noted that Amelia seemed to him more dainty, more fragile than she had ever been before, and his heart surged out toward her. Then she raised her eyes slowly, and held him, until from their depths she stabbed with one swift glance, a glance full of all accusation, indictment and reproach. The stab went to his heart with a pain that made him exclaim. Then perceiving that the complicating moments were flying, he rose hastily, and with half an apology to Miss Greene, he rushed across the dining-room.