"Then you have definite plans?" Ethel asked.
"Perfectly definite, my dear. I have only been waiting to put them into execution. The time has now arrived. We will get the necessary clothes—for in order to obtain the entrée to the Casino, one must be decently dressed—and we will go to Monte Carlo at once. Three days' careful play at roulette—for I do not intend to go near the trente-et-quarante tables—will either see us with a sufficient fortune for our needs or take all we have got. Even if it does, we shall be little worse off than we are at present. Nothing can take my hundred a year from me, and you will easily find another post. It may even be that you can obtain a week's leave of absence from those old cats. It is worth while trying, at any rate. If not, you must resign the whole thing. For my part, I feel fully confident that you will never have to go back to such dreary drudgery."
Confidence expressed in an authoritative tone by an elder is infectious. Confidence already backed up by an initial proof is more infectious still. Ethel McMahon's scruples, doubts and hesitations vanished utterly, and she threw herself wholeheartedly into her mother's scheme.
CHAPTER IV
At six o'clock Basil came for Ethel. Mrs. McMahon greeted him rather more kindly than usual, and he noticed it with some surprise, for he was always conscious that the old lady did not care much for him. A humble-minded man, and bitterly conscious of his unsuccessful life, he was certain that such a radiant being as Ethel was a thousand times too good for him, and was even inclined to acquiesce in the old lady's estimate in a way that provoked his fiancée enormously.
He noticed also that in addition to the access of kindliness, there was a distinct patronage in Mrs. McMahon's manner. Her usual despondency seemed to have disappeared. She spoke largely and vaguely of "the future." He could not understand it at all.
"What on earth has happened to your mother?" he asked Ethel, as they descended the stone stairs towards the street. "I never saw her so chirpy, darling."
Ethel hesitated for a moment. She was bright and animated herself, and she pressed his arm affectionately before replying. She was so accustomed to share her every hope and thought with her lover that she found it difficult to frame a suitable reply. "Oh, well, you know, mother has ups and downs like the rest of us," she said at length. "To-day she is in particularly good spirits."