“Mrs. Darrell, the widowed daughter of General Brandon. General Brandon is one of the vestrymen at St. Gabriel’s Chapel,” replied Reginald, stiffly.
“Yes, fine old fellow. I knew him more than thirty years ago when he was a captain of infantry out on the plains and I was a sutler, as it was called then. Handsome old chap still, and his daughter is like him. You show good taste, my boy. I thought you’d find something more entertaining than religion out at that chapel.”
Reginald Clavering scorned to reply to this, but went on to his study in another part of the house. In a few minutes he heard his father’s step on the stair, and dutifully opened the door for him. Clavering entered, threw himself in a great chair, and began to look around him with an amused smile. The room was a museum of ecclesiastical pictures and gimcracks.
“When I was your age,” said Clavering, laughing openly, “I hadn’t a room like this—I shared a board shanty with a fellow from God knows where, who had served a term in state’s prison. But he was the finest smelter expert I ever saw, and had the best eye for a pretty woman. You couldn’t see the boards in our walls for the pictures of ballet dancers and the like. Nothing in the least like this.” And he laughed.
Reginald’s pale face flushed with many emotions. His father’s tone and manner expressed a frank scorn for him and all his surroundings. Clavering kept on:—
“My roommate—nobody had a room to himself in those diggings—taught me how to differentiate among pretty women.” Clavering was diverted at the spectacle of a man shrinking from such a discussion. “Now, of your sisters, Anne is really the best looking—the most effective, that is. Élise and Lydia are of the tulip variety. Anne is something more and different.”
“Élise and Lydia are both of them strikingly like you, sir,” replied Reginald. It was the nearest approach to sarcasm he had ever made in his life. Clavering enjoyed the cut at himself immensely.
“Very neat; thank you. Now I should say that Mrs.—what’s her name?—old Brandon’s daughter is a remarkably attractive, even beautiful woman, although she strikes me at first glance as one of those women, not exactly young, who haven’t yet found themselves. Perhaps you’ll show the lady the way.”
“Sir,” said Reginald, after a pause, “you shock me!”