This was the widow, of course. The doctor surmised this at once. Besides, he had met her. Her name was Mrs. Carrolton, and Mrs. Carrolton was the name he had heard so frequently in the hotel. The doctor did not like the looks of Mrs. Carrolton. She was beautiful, undeniably, in a way; but her blue eyes were shifting, and her mouth, when in repose, had hard lines. She was not the type of woman he liked to have Burke with, and he would not have supposed she was the sort of woman that Burke himself would care for. And to see him now, hanging upon her every word—
With a gesture of disgust the doctor turned his back and stalked to the farther side of the room, much to the surprise of a vapid young woman, to whom (he remembered when it was too late) he had been supposed to be talking.
A little later, in the dining-room, where he had passed so many restful hours with Burke and his father, about the softly lighted table, the doctor now, in the midst of a chattering, thronging multitude, attempted to keep his own balance, and that of a tiny, wobbly plate, intermittently heaped with salads, sandwiches, cakes, and creams, which he was supposed to eat, but which he momentarily and terrifyingly expected to deposit upon a silken gown or a spotless shirt-front.
The doctor was one of the first of John Denby's guests to make his adieus. He had decided suddenly that he must get away, quite away, from the sight of Burke and the little widow. Otherwise he should say something—a very strong something; and, for obvious reasons, he really could say—nothing.
Disgusted, frightened, annoyed, and aggrieved, he went home the next morning. To his sister he said much. He could talk to his sister. He gave first a full account of what he had seen and heard in Dalton, omitting not one detail. Then, wrathfully, he reproached her:—
"So you see what's come of your foolishness. Burke isn't building bridges for the Hottentots now. He's giving pink teas to flighty blondes."
Mrs. Thayer laughed softly.
"But that's only another way of trying to get away from himself, Frank," she argued.
"Yes, but I notice he isn't trying to get away from the widow," he snapped.
A disturbed frown came to the lady's face.