Delia flushed abruptly; she was irritated and bewildered by Charlotte’s oracular phrases, doled out between parsimonious lips.
“You don’t mean that he has offered himself and then drawn back? I can’t think him capable of such an insult to Tina.”
“He has not insulted Tina. He has simply told her that he can’t afford to marry. Until he chooses a profession his father will allow him only a few hundred dollars a year; and that may be suppressed if—if he marries against his parents’ wishes.”
It was Delia’s turn to be silent. The past was too overwhelmingly resuscitated in Charlotte’s words. Clement Spender stood before her, irresolute, impecunious, persuasive. Ah, if only she had let herself be persuaded!
“I’m very sorry that this should have happened to Tina. But as Lanning appears to have behaved honourably, and withdrawn without raising false expectations, we must hope ... we must hope....” Delia paused, not knowing what they must hope.
Charlotte Lovell laid down her knitting. “You know as well as I do, Delia, that every young man who is inclined to fall in love with Tina will find as good reasons for not marrying her.”
“Then you think Lanning’s excuses are a pretext?”
“Naturally. The first of many that will be found by his successors—for of course he will have successors. Tina—attracts.”
“Ah,” Delia murmured.
Here they were at last face to face with the problem which, through all the years of silence and evasiveness, had lain as close to the surface as a corpse too hastily buried! Delia drew another deep breath, which again was almost one of relief. She had always known that it would be difficult, almost impossible, to find a husband for Tina; and much as she desired Tina’s happiness, some inmost selfishness whispered how much less lonely and purposeless the close of her own life would be should the girl be forced to share it. But how say this to Tina’s mother?