Mrs. Latimer laughed hysterically. “ ‘V-Vernon, Past and—Present.’ The—the whole story of Vernon.”
“Now fancy!” said Stacey.
CHAPTER XIV
It occurred to Stacey, however, that he had spent more than he could afford lately and had nothing with which to go on his travels. And this seemed an excellent excuse for remaining at home. But he presently recollected that on one War Christmas his father had made him a gift of Liberty bonds. He sold one, with a sense of resignation. He did not feel irony in the ease with which he could solve all financial difficulties, for the idea of personal virtue, asceticism, was absent from his mind. He was sending all that money to Vienna because he wanted to send it, not because he felt he ought to; he kept out two hundred dollars a month because he wanted them; and he sold a thousand-dollar bond now simply because if he was to go on a journey he needed money.
It is much more difficult to understand why he was going on a journey at all. He was not affectionate enough to be going simply because Mrs. Latimer had asked him to. And one can hardly take seriously the reason he gave his sister, Julie.
He drove around to her house the afternoon before his departure, and on his way caught sight of Irene Loeffler walking briskly toward him and signalling violently. He waved his hat, but dashed by her in a burst of speed.
“You know, Julie,” he said, a few minutes later, sprawling on the davenport in his sister’s living-room, “it’s all due to you that I’m going away.”
“To me!”
“Absolutely! You lure me to your house, and then you turn an unscrupulous woman loose on me, and she makes my life unbearable, and I—”
“Who?” cried Julie, her eyes dancing.