"Well, when I was seventeen or eighteen—but there never was anything serious about it, really. Since then—you wouldn't believe how rarely women of my type meet men—interesting men. You have to make a point of meeting them, I suppose. And I've been here at home. I'm thirty-three. Not bad looking. I've kept my figure, and hair, and skin. Walking, I suppose. The men I know are snuffy bachelors nearing fifty, or widowers with three children. They'd rather go to a musical show than a symphony concert; they'll tell you they do enough walking in their business. I don't mind their being bald—though why should they be?—but I do mind their being snuffy. I suppose there are men of about my own age who like the things I like; whose viewpoint is mine. But attractive men of thirty-five marry girls of twenty. I don't want to marry a boy of twenty; but neither can I work up any enthusiasm for a man of fifty who tells me that what he wants is a home, and who would no more take a tramp in the country for enjoyment than he would contemplate a trip to Mars."
Emma Barton interposed. "What were you doing at twenty-five?"
Lottie glanced around the room. Her hand came out in a little gesture that included the house and its occupants. "Just what I'm doing now. But not even thinking about it—as I do now! I think I had an idea I was important. Now that I look back on it, it seems to me I've just been running errands for the last ten years or more. Running errands up and down, while the world has gone by."
Two days before her mother's return Lottie prevailed upon Jeannette to invite a half dozen or more of her business college acquaintances to spend the evening at the house. Jeannette demurred at first, but it was plain the idea fascinated her. Seven of them arrived at the time appointed. Their ages ranged between seventeen and twenty-two. The girls were amazingly well dressed in georgettes and taffetas and smart slippers and silk stockings. The boys were, for the most part, of the shipping-clerk type. They were all palpably impressed with the big old house on Prairie, its massive furniture and pictures, its occupants. Lottie met them all, as did Aunt Charlotte who had donned her second-best black silk and her jewelry and had crimped her hair for the occasion. She sensed that what Jeannette needed was background. Aunt Charlotte vanished before nine and Lottie did likewise, to appear again only for the serving of the ice cream and cake. They danced, sang, seemed really to enjoy the evening. After they had gone Jeannette turned to Lottie and catching up one of her hands pressed it against her own glowing cheek. Her eyes were very bright. They—and the gesture—supplied the meaning that her inarticulate speech lacked. "It was grand!"
It was typical of Charley and indicative of the freedom with which she lived, that her existence during the ten days of her mother's absence did not vary at all from the usual. She would have been torn between laughter and fury could she have realised the sense of boldness and freedom with which Lottie, her aunt, and Charlotte, her great-aunt, set about planning their innocent maidenly revels.
Mrs. Payson and Belle returned from French Lick the first week in May. Mrs. Payson, divesting herself of her wraps, ran a quick and comprehensive eye over the room, over Lottie, over Aunt Charlotte, Jeannette, Hulda. It was as though she read Coffee! Tea Party! Dinner! Dance! in their faces. Her first question seemed to carry with it a hidden meaning. "Well, what have you been doing while I've been gone? Did Brosch call up about the plastering? Did you have Henry and Charley to dinner? Any letters? How many days did you have Mrs. Schlagel for the cleaning? Lottie, get me a cup of tea. I feel kind of faint—not hungry, but a faint feeling. Oh—Ben Gartz was in French Lick. Did I write you? He was very attentive. Very. Every inch the gentleman. I don't know what Belle and I would have done without him."
CHAPTER XII
For fifteen years Mrs. Carrie Payson's bitterness at the outcome of her own unfortunate marriage had been unconsciously expressed in her attitude toward the possible marriage of her daughter Lottie. Confronted with this accusation, she would have denied it and her daughter Lottie would have defended her in the denial. Nevertheless, it was true. During the years when all Mrs. Payson's energy, thought, and time were devoted to the success of the real estate and bond business, her influence had been less markedly felt than later. In some indefinable way the few men who came within Lottie's ken were startled and repelled by the grim white-haired woman who regarded them with eyes of cold hostility. One or two of them had said, uncomfortably, in one of Mrs. Payson's brief absences, "Your mother doesn't like me."
"What nonsense! Why shouldn't she?"
"I don't know. She looks at me as if she had something on me." Then as Lottie stiffened perceptibly, "Oh, I didn't mean that exactly. No offence, I hope. I just meant——"