“I’ll put the Planet out of business!” stormed Jim Sargent, stalking up and down the library, with his fists clenched and his face purple. “I’ll bankrupt them!” and he paused, as he passed, to reassuringly pat the shoulder of poor Aunt Grace, who sat perfectly numb holding one thumb until the bone ached. Her eyes were frankly red, and the creases of worry had set into her brow so deeply that they must have scarred her skull. “I’ll hunt up the whelp who wrote that stuff, and the cur who drew it, and the dog who inserted it!” frothed the raging Jim. “I’ll—”
“The press is the palladium of our national liberty, Uncle Jim,” drawled the soothing voice of Ted.
“You can’t do a thing about it,” counselled Gerald Fosland, a stiff looking gentleman who never made a mistake of speech, or manner, or attire.
“Shucks, Gail!” suddenly remembered Lucile. “The big Faulker reception is this week, and your gown was to be so stunning. Don’t go home!”
Mrs. Helen Davies cast on her feather-brained daughter a glance of severe reproof.
“Have you no sense of propriety, Lucile?” she warned. “Gail, very naturally, can not remain here under the circumstances. It does great credit to her that, immediately upon realising this horrible occurrence, she telegraphed to her mother, without consulting any of us, that she was returning.”
“I just wanted to go home,” said Gail, her chin quivering and her pretty throat tremulous with breath pent from sobbing.
“It’ll all blow over, Gail,” argued Uncle Jim, in deep distress because she was going so soon. If she had only stopped long enough to pack up, they might have persuaded her to stay. “Just forget it, and have a good time.”
“Jim,” ordered the stern voice of Aunt Helen, “will you be kind enough to see if any one is out in front?”
“Certainly,” agreed Jim, wondering why his wife’s sister was suddenly so severe with him.