She nodded, and he studied her closely for a moment, and then he could not resist the question that all along had been torturing him.
“And for—?”
She confirmed his fear, with quick decisive little nods. She got out her handkerchief and hastily brushed her tears away, and then with an effort to control herself, she looked at him and said, as if she were ready to have it all out then:
“Yes, father, I haven’t treated him right. I came away without telling him.”
Judge Blair scowled and turned away, and bit the end of his cigar. Then he sat and studied it. Lavinia waited; she was ready for the final contest. Presently the judge arose.
“Well, dear,” he said. “Well—we’ll see; of course, we can’t go back just yet—I have my address to read to-morrow, and besides, some of the boys are talking of me for president of the Bar Association. And I had thought, I had thought, that a little trip over to Detroit, and maybe up to Mackinac—”
“Father,” said Lavinia, looking at him now calmly, “I don’t want to go to Detroit or up to Mackinac. I’ll do, of course, as you say; I’ll wait until the Bar meeting is over, but I want to go home. You might as well know now, father—we might as well understand each other—it can be no other way.”
Judge Blair looked at his daughter a moment, and she kept her eyes directly and firmly in his.
“Oh well,” he said with a sigh, “of course, dear, if you say. I’d like to stay until after the election though. Will you?”
“Of course,” she consented.