“I’ll say they are!” said Hugh emphatically. He was thoughtful for a space. “Carol all alone,” he said presently. “I tell you, Mr. Ogden, it makes me feel like taking a brace and amounting to something. I read law the last year before the war. I’d like to go on with it. If Carol’s partner in the business is unreliable, I’d like to be able to attend to him.”
“I’ve been talking to an ex-lawyer to-day, one who has made his mark. Little Miss Duane’s grandfather. He is a veteran of the Cuban War. Colonel Duane. Perhaps he has his law library still.”
“He could steer me, anyway,” replied Hugh, looking interested—“if I should stay on in the town,” he added, looking away. After another pause he went on: “It was good fun to see Ally again and made everything seem more familiar.”
“How much do you know about Mrs. Reece-Lumbard?” asked Ogden.
Hugh laughed reminiscently. “Nothing except those twinkly fingers of hers. She tried some highbrow stuff on us at first—uplift, artistic, that kind; but when she found we walked out on her she changed. Great Scott, she could whoop it up, and we sang till the roof nearly lifted. I may have heard her name in those days, but if I did I’d forgotten it.”
“Well, she married Tom Reece,” said Ogden. “He was in the Medical Corps over there, and when they came home they had a baby with them, and Mrs. Reece, being a very gay lady, they had lots of trouble. She was shining in cabaret performances when I knew her, and last winter I learned that there was a divorce. To-day I asked her, when we were alone in the hall, about her baby girl, and she said she hadn’t brought her, fearing a child in the house might annoy her Aunt Susanna.”
“Well, that was considerate, wasn’t it?” returned Hugh, in defense against Ogden’s manner. “A woman never gets any sympathy.”
“The courts didn’t give Mrs. Reece any,” said Ogden dryly. “I knew that Dr. Reece was given the custody of the little girl. I just wanted to see what she would say about it.”
Hugh’s brow clouded. “I’m sorry to hear of that mess,” he replied. “Is that why you think she is deceiving Miss Frink about herself? People that live in glass houses, you know.”