But her father put his finger on her lip, saying: "Don't, daughter; it is not a gracious thing to speak of a mother's faults."
And Sybil said, hastily: "I beg your pardon, papa!" Then, as they rose, she put her hands on his shoulders and asked, very prettily: "Papa, will you not in so many words give me your permission to try for a position on the stage? Miss Morrell will not move an inch without it."
"She is a good woman, an honest woman!" he said. Then he put his hand under Sybil's chin and, lifting her face to the moonlight, looked steadily at her a long moment, sighed heavily, and answered: "Since you are so determined, dear, yes, you may tell Miss Morrell you are acting with my permission in seeking to enter her profession." And he put her quickly from him and went slowly into the house, stumbling up the stairs in the darkness.
And Sybil lifted her arms above her head, stretching her hands up toward the moon in a very ecstasy of joy. "Oh," she whispered, "am I to escape from this 'slough of despond'—am I to have my chance in life? Perhaps I may become successful, happy?"
And right across her smiling, upturned face a hideous creature of the night flew so low, so near, one leathery wing touched her loosened hair. She flung her hands across her face with a startled cry, then laughed a little tremulously, saying: "B-r-r-r! a bat—ugh! How I loathe them! I—I think I'll go in" and she entered the house, closing and with some difficulty locking the door in the darkness.
As she reached the top step of the stairs a door opened, and Mrs. Lawton in her undress uniform of mind as well as body, a guttering candle held high above her head, stood enframed in the doorway—Mrs. Lawton in night-dress and knitted bedroom slippers, but without her upper teeth, without her thick switch of hair, without her rosy bloom of rouge vinaigre; and without all these things it was surprising how little there seemed to be left of the every-day familiar Letitia Lawton. Looking at the small, sleek head; the pallid, sunken face; the flattened figure—Sybil thought, rather wickedly: "This is a sort of skeleton mamma. I wonder if papa would like to put her in the closet?"
But the lady was addressing her querulously: "Oh, you have decided it to be worth while to follow a mother's suggestion, and come into the house at last? In former days I could have called in a doctor for every chill in the family, even for the servants—though, to tell the truth, servants rarely have real hearty chills; indeed, I doubt their ability to contract genuine malaria. It's a mere desire to imitate their employers. But now that your poor father has lost everything—that is, everything except his good name [with a stinging look at Sybil, which, that young person understood perfectly]—I can only defend the health of my family with the quinine bottle, and I do think you and your father might have held your secret consultation inside the house. I'm sure neither Dorothy nor I would have tried to pry!"
"Oh, mamma!" indignantly exclaimed Sybil, "you know what I was asking of papa!"
"I know!" broke in Mrs. Lawton, "that you were twisting him about your little finger, as you usually do. It is not for a father to decide a girl's destiny, without even asking the mother's advice. You two have connived together, I believe, with that Morrell woman, who has not even called upon the mother she would rob! But remember this—the house that is divided against itself goes to the wall, or—er falls, or something; and how you can stand and laugh at the mother that bore you is more than I can understand! Your Grandmother Bassett never received such treatment from me—I know that! But you and your father may think everything is safely settled, and you as good as on the stage; but let me tell you I am not quite helpless in this matter. There is still one link between me and the life of ease and luxury and beauty I once knew! You seem to forget you have a god-mother—though how you can forget the only human being who has been able to give you presents for ten long years, I don't know! But you have a god-mother, and Sybil Van Camp has at least enough of her fortune left to merit our respect! Oh, you need not pout! Down you go to-morrow to Mrs. Van Camp, and if she sees no shame in spreading the name of Lawton all over New York, well and good! She was a power in her day. I nearly fainted from joy and pride when she consented to stand god-mother to you! You don't like to trouble her—very private matter? I wish it was a private matter. As for trouble, didn't she vow in church to become your surety and see that you renounced things and—ah, well, what's a god-mother for if she don't take some responsibility? Anyway, you go on to no stage without Mrs. Van Camp's consent, nor without proper social amenities being extended to your mother!
"And Sybil, I simply can't be kept standing here all night in my state of health! Of course, dear, I am interested in all your plans, but it would have been more thoughtful had you waited till morning to talk them over. But that's where you take after your poor father in a certain unpremeditated selfishness—unpremeditated, I admit, for he's a gentleman and you've had the upbringing of a lady—though you are deprived of the surroundings of one, but through no fault of yours or mine! John!"—turning sharply to peer into the darkness behind her—"what are you groaning about, I'd like to know? It's my legs and back that are bearing the fatigue of this interview. I saw you took good care to loll comfortably through your talk with Sybil. So why you should groan now, I don't know, unless you've hit your bunion on the frame of the sewing-machine again, and you generally swear a little when you do that. Sybil, I'm fairly worn out in mind as well as body, and you tore your veil the other day, didn't you? Cheap lace always goes that way. There was a time when my veils made people turn around to look at them. I had one with a border of grapes and vines, I remember; I am always an honest woman, and as the border had the effect of cutting off one's chin, I can't pretend it was becoming—but, my dear, it cost thirty dollars, as I'm a living woman! But you can wear my net veil to-morrow, and you will have to take Dorothy with you, for I shall be utterly used up and unable to chaperon you; though once they get you upon the stage, I suppose you'll go prancing about without attendance of any sort. But until that time, you will show some respect to social conventions. Good-night, Sybil! Take a quinine pill before you go to bed. You have advanced me well upon my way to the grave this day. But I can't forget you are my child, and if you should get a chill, you couldn't go down to Mrs. Van Camp, who will probably put an estoppel upon these theatre plans of yours. Yes, yes! John! I'm coming! It does seem that I might be allowed to speak a few words of advice and caution to my own daughter without interruption every moment or two!"