“Come in, Raymond,” he said as he opened it. “Violet’s been talking of nothing but you. So here we all are, bride and bridegroom and best man. Let’s have one cigarette before we all go to bed.”
Raymond wore his most savage look. “I thought you had gone to bed,” he said, “and I thought you said Violet had gone to bed half an hour before that?”
“Oh, Raymond, don’t be vexed,” said Colin. “Haven’t you got everything?”
In just such a voice, dexterously convincing, had he pleaded with Violet that she should forgive his father....
CHAPTER VII
Philip was waiting in his library for Raymond’s entry, wanting to feel sorry for him, but as often as he could darken his mind behind that cloud, the edges of it grew dazzlingly bright with the thought of Colin, and the sun re-emerging warmed and delighted him....
Yet he was sorry for Raymond, and presently he would express his sympathy, coldly and correctly, he was afraid, with regret and truism and paternal platitudes; but duty would dictate his sentiments. At the most he could not hope for more than to give the boy the impression he was sorry, and conceal from him his immensurable pleasure in the news Colin had made known to him. All these weeks, ever since, on that morning in Capri, he had learned of Raymond’s engagement and Colin’s desire, he had never been free from heartache, and his favourite’s manliness, his refusal to be embittered, his efforts with himself, gaily heroic, had but rendered those pangs the more poignant. And in the hour of his joy Colin had shewn just the same marvellous quickness of sympathy for Raymond’s sorrow, as, when Philip had first told him of the engagement, he had shewn for Raymond’s happiness.
“I would have given anything to spare Raymond this, father,” he had said. “As you know, I kept all I felt to myself. I didn’t let Violet see how miserable I was, and how I wanted her. And then last night—it was like some earthquake within. Everything toppled and fell; Vi and I were left clinging to each other.”
After Colin, Philip had seen Violet, and she, too, had spoken to him with a simplicity and candour.... She had already begun to love Colin, she thought, before she accepted Raymond, but how she loved Stanier. She had been worldly, ambitious, stifling the first faint calls of her heart, thinking, as many a girl thought, whose nature is not yet wholly awake, that Raymond would “do,” as regards herself, and “do” magnificently as regards her longing for all that being mistress of Stanier meant to her. Then came Colin’s return from Italy, and the whisper of her heart grew louder. She could not help contrasting her lover with her friend, and in that new light Raymond’s attentions to her, his caresses, his air—she must confess—of proprietorship grew odious and insufferable. And then, just as Colin had said, came the earthquake. In that disruption, all that from the worldly point of view seemed so precious, turned to dross.
At that point she hesitated a moment, and Philip had found himself recording how like she was to Colin. With just that triumphant glow of happiness with which he had said: “Raymond has got Stanier, father, Violet and I have got each other,” so Violet now, after her momentary hesitation, spoke to him.