“Oh, well—that’s the law of life, isn’t it?” His tone seemed to say: “At any rate, it’s the one you obeyed in your own youth.” And again she found no answer.
She was conscious that the gaze he still fixed on her had passed from benevolence to wistfulness. “Do you still mind it so awfully?”
His question made her tears rise; but she was determined not to return upon the past. She had proved the uselessness of the attempt.
“Anne has announced her engagement. What more is there to say? You tell me she needs me; well, here I am with her.”
“And you don’t know how she appreciates it. She rang me up as soon as you got back this morning. She’s overcome by your generosity in going down to the Drovers’ after what had taken place between you—after her putting herself so completely in the wrong.” He paused again, as if weighing his next words. “You know I’m not any keener than you are about this marriage; but, my dear, I believe it had to be.”
“Had to be?”
His capacious forehead crimsoned with the effort to explain. “Well, Anne’s a young woman of considerable violence of feeling ... of ... of.... In short, there’s no knowing what she might have ended by doing if we’d all backed you up in opposing her. And I confess I didn’t feel sure enough of the young man to count on his not taking advantage of her ... her impetuosity, as it were, if he thought there was no other chance.... You understand?”
She understood. What he was trying to say was that, on the whole, given the girl’s self-will, and taking into account her ... well, her peculiar heredity ... taking into account, in fact, Kate Clephane herself ... the family had probably adopted the safest course in accepting the situation.
“Not that I mean to imply—of course not! Only the young people nowadays settle most questions for themselves, don’t they? And in this case ... Well, all’s well that ends well. We all know that some of the most successful marriages have had ... er ... rather risky preliminaries.”
Kate Clephane sat listening in a state of acquiescent lassitude. She felt as if she had been given a drug which had left her intelligence clear but paralyzed her will. What was the use of arguing, discussing, opposing? Later, of course, if everything else failed, Fred Landers was after all the person she would have to turn to, to whom her avowal would have to be made; but for the moment he was of no more use to her than any of the others. The game she had resolved to play must be played between herself and Chris Fenno; everything else was the vainest expenditure of breath.