Emily, all a-tingle with the exhilaration which an angel inevitably feels when descending upon a glittering abode of vice, had tried hard not to betray her excitement. In a tone essenced with pious sorrow and celestial distress! She had assured the erring one (though not in these words), that all would be forgiven if only she returned to her home before the world (of the Barrs) should discover that a Barr had abandoned Brooklyn for Kips Bay, and her family for the society of atheists, Bolshevists, and Bohemians!
"But I haven't the faintest notion of abandoning you," Janet had replied. "I believe I can lead a fuller, freer, more active life away from mother's apron strings, that's all. Of course I want to see the family from time to time. I could come on short visits—"
Emily had assured her, not without a trace of exultation, that Mrs. Barr would never hear of such a cool arrangement. Either the prodigal daughter returned once and for all, or the family would treat her as dead.
"Really! But how you'll miss the funeral!" Janet had wickedly exclaimed.
At which Emily had put on her gloves.
All later messages sent by Janet to her mother in an effort to put their mutual relations on a more reasonable footing had been severely ignored. The only communications she had received were growingly infrequent notes from her father, and these contained nothing but the same old appeals—sentimental, pathetic, fatuous.
III
The doorbell startled her out of her long, melancholy reverie. She flew to the threshold, and in came Claude! She had proposed to treat him coolly at their next meeting. But his return was as sudden as it was unexpected. And he was Claude, the same Claude with the same striking appearance, the same telling voice, the same handsome face. Instantly, the magnetic spark that had darted from one to the other at the Outlaws' Ball made its swift, poignant, thrilling leap between them again.
Though words were superfluous, Claude, as he clasped her in a passionate embrace, murmured:
"Janet, darling, forgive me. I was a beast to write a letter like that."