“Oh, Mrs. Baker,” wheezed Mrs. Corkran with asthmatic fervour, “I think you’re altogether too cynical; I’m sure that’s not your opinion of Mr. Baker.”
“I don’t know what he might do if I was dead,” replied Mrs. Baker, “but I’ll answer for it he’ll not be carrying on with Number Two while I’m alive, like other people I know!”
“Oh, don’t say such things before these young ladies,” said Mrs. Corkran; “I wish them no greater blessing of Providence than a good husband, and I think I may say that dear Carrie will find one in my Joseph.”
The almost death-bed solemnity of this address paralysed the conversation for a moment, and Miss Beattie concealed her blushes by going to the window to see whose was the vehicle that had just driven by.
“Oh, it’s Mr. Hawkins!” she exclaimed, feeling the importance of the information.
Kathleen Baker sprang from her seat and ran to the window. “So it is!” she cried, “and I bet you sixpence he’s going to Rosemount! My goodness, I wish it was to-day we had gone there!”
CHAPTER XLIII.
Hawkins had, like Mrs. Baker, been in no hurry to call upon the bride. He had seen her twice in church, he had once met her out driving with her husband, and, lastly, he had come upon her face to face in the principal street of Lismoyle, and had received a greeting of aristocratic hauteur, as remarkable as the newly acquired English accent in which it was delivered. After these things a visit to her was unavoidable, and, in spite of a bad conscience, he felt, when he at last set out for Rosemount, an excitement that was agreeable after the calm of life at Lismoyle.
There was no one in the drawing-room when he was shown into it, and as the maid closed the door behind him he heard a quick step run through the hall and up the stairs. “Gone to put on her best bib and tucker,” he said to himself with an increase of confidence; “I’ll bet she saw me coming.” The large photograph alluded to by Miss Baker was on the chimneypiece, and he walked over and examined it with great interest. It obeyed the traditions of honeymoon portraits, and had the inevitable vulgarity of such; Lambert, sitting down, turned the leaves of a book, and Francie, standing behind him, rested one hand on his shoulder, while the other held a basket of flowers. In spite of its fatuity as a composition, both portraits were good, and they had moreover an air of prosperity and new clothes that Mr. Hawkins found to be almost repulsive. He studied the photograph with deepening distaste until he was aware of a footstep at the door, and braced himself for the encounter, with his heart beating uncomfortably and unexpectedly.
They shook hands with the politeness of slight acquaintance, and sat down, Hawkins thinking he had never seen her look so pretty or so smart, and wondering what he was going to talk to her about. It was evidently going to be war to the knife, he thought, as he embarked haltingly upon the weather, and found that he was far less at his ease than he had expected to be.