The old man's head lifted with a jerk, and he looked at her with mingled fear and fury. "What do you mean?"
"Anything you want to have it mean," she replied. "You drive him out and you drive me out—that's what I mean."
Blondell saw in her face the look of the woman who is willing to assume any guilt, any shame for her lover, and, dropping his eyes before her gaze, growled a curse and left the room.
Fan turned to her lover with a ringing, boyish laugh, "It's all right, Dell; he's surrendered!"
III
Lester passed the month before his marriage in alternating uplifts and depressions, and the worst of it lay in the fact that his moments of exaltation were sensual—of the flesh, and born of the girl's presence—while his depression came from his sane contemplation of the fate to which he was hastening. He went one day to talk it all over with Mrs. Baker, who now held a dark opinion of Fan Blondell. She frankly advised him to break the engagement and to go back to England.
"I can't do that, my dear Mrs. Baker. I am too far committed to Fan to do that. Besides, I know she would make a terrible scene. She would follow me. And besides, I am fond of her, you know. She's very beautiful, now—and she does love me, poor beggar! I wonder at it, but she does." Then he brightened up. "You know she has the carriage of a duchess. Really, if she were trained a little she would be quite presentable anywhere."
Mrs. Baker shook her head. "She's at her best this minute. Look at the mother; that's what she'll be like in a few years."
"Oh no—not really! She's an improvement—a vast improvement—on the old people, don't you think?"
"You can't make a purse out of a sow's ear. Fan will sag right down after marriage. Mark my words. She's a slattern in her blood, and before the honeymoon is over she'll be slouching around in old slippers and her nightgown. That is plain talk, Mr. Lester, but I can't let you go into this trap with your eyes shut."