"Of course he will get well. He's as strong as an ox. Don't be silly."
The next day she and Lutie met in the library and had it out,—briefly, as I said before, but with astounding clarity. Mrs. Tresslyn swept into the library at four in the afternoon, coming direct from her home, where, as she afterwards felt called upon to explain in self-defence, the telephone was aggravatingly out of order,—and that was why she hadn't called up to inquire!—(It is so often the case when one really wants to use the stupid thing!) She was on the point of entering the sick-room when Lutie came up from behind.
"I'm afraid you can't go in just now, Mrs. Tresslyn," she said, firmly and yet courteously.
George's mother started as if stung. "Oh!" she exclaimed, and her tone was so declaratory that it was not necessary to add the unspoken—"it's you, is it?"
"He is asleep," said Lutie gently. "They won't even allow me to go in."
This was too much for Mrs. Tresslyn. She transfixed the slight, tired-eyed young woman with a look that would have chilled any one else to the bone—the high-bred look that never fails to put the lowly in their places.
"Indeed," she said, with infinite irony in her voice. "This is Miss Carnahan, I believe?" She lifted her lorgnon as a further aid to inspection.
"I am the person you have always spoken of as Miss Carnahan," said Lutie calmly. Throughout the brief period in which she had been legally the wife of George Tresslyn, Lutie was never anything but Miss Carnahan to her mother-in-law. Mrs. Tresslyn very carefully forbore giving her daughter-in-law a respectable name. "I was afraid you might have forgotten me."
"You will forgive me if I confess that I have tried very hard to forget you, Miss Carnahan," said the older woman.
"It isn't my fault that you haven't been able to do so," said Lutie. "Please! you are not to go in." Mrs. Tresslyn's hand was turning the door-knob.