Her husband laughed.
"Colorless, is good, by Jove! You colorless indeed!" He looked admiringly at his wife. "Why, Katherine, you have more color and more sense now than any half dozen girls of this generation. Colorless indeed!" Mrs. Foster smiled. "Don't you think my cheerful, easy reflection of your own shades of thought or mind have always passed current as my own? Sometimes I fancy that is true, and that—it is easier and—pleasanter all around. But—" she paused. "It was not my color, my thought, my opinions, myself. It was an echo, dear; a pleasant echo of yourself which has so charmed you. It was not I."
Gertrude felt uneasy, and as if she were lifting a curtain which had been long drawn. Her father turned his face towards her and then toward her mother.
"In God's name what does all this mean?" he asked. "Are you, the most level-headed woman in the world, intending to uphold Gertrude in this—suicidal policy—her—this—absurd nonsense about that girl?"
Gertrude's eyes widened. She slowly arose from his knee. The revelation as to her father's mental outlook was, to her more sensitive and developed nature, much what the one had been to Francis King that night at the club.
"Oh, papa," she said softly. "I am so sorry for—so sorry—for us all. We seem so far apart, and—"
"John Martin agrees with me perfectly," said her father, hotly. "I talked with him to-day. He—"
Gertrude glanced at her mother, and there was a definite curl upon her lip. "Mr. Martin," she said slowly, "is not a conscience for me. He and I are leagues apart, papa. We—"
"More's the pity," said her father, as he arose from his chair. He moved toward the door.
"I've said my say, Gertrude. It's perfectly incomprehensible to me what you two are aiming at. But what I know is this: you must do my way in this particular case, think whatever you please. You know very well I would not ask it except for your own good. I don't like to interfere with your plans, but—you must give that girl up." He spoke kindly, but Gertrude and her mother sat silent long after he had gone. The twilight had passed into darkness. Presently Katherine's voice broke the silence:—