“What then? Look here, Calvin Stone, you can’t fool your mother and me. You act like a sheep-stealing dog. What were you doing in Rochester yesterday?”
“I was married.”
The words fell with the dull impact of a mass of putty. His father’s eyes opened wide, then narrowed, and his huge shoulders bent forward.
“Who did you marry? Vine wasn’t with you.”
“That’s just the trouble, father. I didn’t marry Vine. Fact is, I didn’t intend to get married at all. Lettie took me by surprise when she told me—”
“Arlette Fournier. She’s French—and a stunner. I met her at a dance last winter. Oh, she’s a good fellow. She’ll keep it secret till I get out of this scrape with Vine. She wouldn’t want me to bring her to Bromfield for a year or two.”
Stone brought his fist down on the table with a vehemence that rattled the breakfast china.
“Have you no conscience, no decency? How are you going to square yourself with that girl?”
“I couldn’t square myself with both of them. I’ve been thinking it over, since I got home last night. I thought I’d play on Vine’s pride ... snub her openly, you know, so that she’d get in a huff and throw me over. Then I could afterwards pretend I married the other girl for spite. That would save Vine’s feelings.”