“Don’t, Mother!” she said softly. “You mustn’t cry about me. I’m not really as bad as you think I am. I’m not worth bothering about, though. But what does it matter—this time?”
“It—it’s always—this time,” she wept.
“No—I’ll go anywhere you like, but not to-night. I do feel badly. I really do. I—I’m not quite up to seeing a lot of people. Don’t cry, dear. You know it will make your eyes red.”
Mrs. Loring set up quickly and touched her eyes with her handkerchief.
“Yes, yes; I know it does. I don’t see how you can hurt me so. I suppose my complexion is ruined and I’ll look like an old hag. It’s a pity! Just after Thiebout had taken such pains with me, too.”
“Oh, no, Mother, you’re all right. You always did look younger than I do—and besides you light up so, at night.”
Mrs. Loring rose and examined her face in a mirror. “Oh, well! I suppose I’ll have to go without you. But I won’t forget it, Jane. It does really seem as though the older I get the less my wishes are considered. But I’ll do my duty as I see it, in spite of you. Do you suppose I had your father build this house just for me to sit in and look out of the windows at the passersby? Not I. Until we came to New York I spent all of my life looking at the gay world out of windows. I’m tired of playing second-fiddle.”
Jane Loring stood before her mother and touched her timidly on the arm. The physical resemblance between them was strong, and it was easily seen where the daughter got her beauty. Mrs. Loring had reached middle life very prettily, and at a single impression it was difficult to tell whether she was nearer thirty-three or fifty-three. Her skin was of that satiny quality which wrinkles depress but do not sear. Her nose was slightly aquiline like her daughter’s, but the years had thinned her lips and sharpened her chin, the lines at her mouth were querulous rather than severe, and when her face was placid, her forehead was as smooth as that of her daughter. She was not a woman who had ever suffered deeply, or who ever would, and the petty annoyances which add small wrinkles to the faces of women of her years had left no marks whatever. But since the family had been in New York Jane had noticed new lines between her brows as though her eyes, like those of a person traveling upon an unfamiliar road, were trying for a more concentrated and narrow vision; and as she turned from the mirror toward the light, it seemed to Jane that she had grown suddenly old.
“Mother, dear, you mustn’t let trifles disturb you so. It will age you frightfully! You know how people are always saying that you look younger than I do. I don’t want to worry you. I’ll do whatever you like, go wherever you like, but not to-night——”