II
Some men in such circumstances brood; some drink; others search out the other woman or women. John Rawn was cast in different mold. He had, in short, spoken truth when he told his wife that he had no new matrimonial plans. Situated thus, yet handicapped thus in his new-found solitude, but a few days had passed before he sent over for his daughter, Grace, and her husband, Charles Halsey; there being in his mind a plan to mitigate certain unpleasant features of his life as he now found it ordered.
He greeted Halsey and Grace at the door gravely, with dignity, when they came one evening in response to his invitation. They entered, just a trifle awed, as they always were, by the august surroundings of Graystone Hall, so different from their own cottage near the factory. The owner of the place looked well the part of owner here. John Rawn still was large and strong, the city had not yet much softened his lines. His hair now was whiter about the temples, but its whiteness left his appearance only the more distinguished. You scarce could have found in all the haunts of prominent citizens a better example of prominent citizen than himself, John Rawn.
The major domo took the wraps of the young people and vanished silently. Rawn, waiting for them in the drawing-room—not in the hall, as once he would have done—with dignity motioned them to places in his presence, even brought a low chair himself for the sad-faced, hunchbacked child which represented the Rawn succession in the third generation.
"Go kiss grandpa, Lola!" said Grace to her daughter; and went to show her the way. But the child, turning suddenly, only hid her face in her mother's skirt.
"Laura's timid," apologized the mother. The disapproval on her father's face was obvious enough. He had passed bitter hours alone, pondering over this child, hesitating whether to love it or to hate it, whether to accept it or to regard it as a blot upon his life. He had hoped a grandson, since he no longer might hope a son of his own. This crippled child was the sole Rawn succession. His pendulous lower lip trembled for a time in the self-pity which now and again came to John Rawn. It seemed hard enough that he, John Rawn, president of the International Power Company, should have no better evidence of gratitude on the part of fortune. He hated Halsey all the more.
III
But now he did not lack directness. "Grace," he said, "I've called you over to-night because to-morrow, as you know, is Friday."
"Yes, Pa."
"And as you know, Grace, your mother—that is to say, the late Mrs. Rawn, always had the way—in short, I may say that she induced me to depend upon—I mean to say that always she had shoulder of pork and cabbage for Friday evening. Now, I am left alone, helpless—it is too much!"