Gwen talked on, and Lawrence listened, falling in with her plans easily enough because he saw no harm in the trick and it was the least trouble. When Mrs Carew joined them later, Gwen was radiant again and rather looking forward to her evening. Afterward she was still more radiant, for everything had gone well. Captain O’Connor, a fiery young officer, spending a month’s leave in Calcutta before starting to England, was quickly brought to reason by Gwen’s charming way of confiding in him, and, while announcing his intention of running himself through, in the same moment grasped Lawrence’s hand, and told him he was the luckiest chap on earth.
The next morning he did actually start for England, a week sooner than he intended, leaving Lord Selloyd to congratulate himself upon having got out of the quarrel so simply.
The incident dispersed Gwen’s passing displeasure with Lawrence also, and she condescended once more to mention the subject of the Adairs, asking him if he had decided what to do. He was standing with his hands in his pockets looking out of the window, and for a moment he did not reply. Gwen came and leaned against the window-frame beside him.
“If you go, Lawrie, are you quite certain it would have to be the pretty one?” she asked.
“Yes—quite,” he answered.
“Then stay here. I’m awfully sorry for them—at least I’m sorry for Paddy,” she continued, as he did not speak, “but I’m absolutely certain it would be a mistake for you to marry the other one. Deep down in your heart you think so yourself, don’t you?”
“I have long been under the impression that I had no heart.”
“Rubbish! Why, that’s what people say about me, and do you think I don’t know better! When ‘John Right’ comes along you’ll all see I’ve got just as much heart as any one else, but until he does—a short life and a merry one, say I! That’s how it will be with you, Lawrie. When Mary Jane Right turns up you’ll tear your hair—what there is of it—and stamp, and rave, and storm, just like any other love-sick male. Till then, if it pleases you to be cynical and blasé, and all that nonsense, why, be cynical and blasé; it doesn’t hurt any one else—in fact, it’s rather amusing,” and she rested her hand on his arm and looked into his face with roguish, laughing eyes. “I’d have just loved to have a brother,” she said, “but, like that nice old General Adair who wanted a son, I guess I’ve got the next best thing.”
So, in the end, Lawrence did not return to England, and nothing happened to avert the hard change for Paddy and Eileen and their mother.