Catherine Cabot’s first talent was that of taking. Whatever she wanted in life she took as her perquisite. Always had she taken admiration, service, flattery, love, sacrifice, money. Literally she had taken her husband because he was useful to her. She proceeded now to take Dolores Trent.
“Oh, my dear, if you could know how unfortunate! Most children have some sort of a chance, but not my poor Jackie. Probably after you have seen him and know something of the disposition that comes from his sufferings, you won’t wish to undertake him. You would need a love for children great enough to include the most unlovable.”
“But I have a great love for children,” Dolores said. “My neighbors used to say that I have a way with them.”
“Mr. Cabot would be relieved of his heaviest burden if we’d find some one who could handle Jack.” Catherine continued her “taking.” “It would seem like a fatality, wouldn’t it, if in return for his small service to you that day at Seff’s——”
“His service wasn’t small, Mrs. Cabot. I may have seemed ungrateful not to thank him, but I—— You see——”
“Of course you couldn’t and of course he didn’t wish you to,” the wife assured her. “But it would be really beautiful—sort of nice and Emersonian—if you could pass along the favor he did you to his child. Suppose you hold an open mind, Miss Trent, until after you’ve met Jack. I’ll come to his rooms later and help to explain him. Morrison will take up all details with you, if you should decide to stay. Won’t you try, anyhow, to forget and forgive my unkindness?”
The girl, still standing just within the door, heard the Frenchman’s congratulation, as the brilliant-looking pair disappeared among the palms of the foyer.
“But you are wonderful, my adored one, most wonderful!”
As Dolores stepped off the elevator onto the third-floor balcony that overlooked the great, glass-domed hall, a woman’s scream cut the quiet. The housekeeper hurried ahead and threw open the door of a large, sun-flooded room.