The family council was over. Friendly farewells were exchanged by all excepting Leo, who still showed a little coldness to his uncle.
“It’s always the security that is lost,” he observed to his mother on the staircase.
“I’d pay it gladly,” said the latter flatly.
“Oh, you. You’re too good,” retorted her son.
“And you’re too ungrateful,” said his mother.
“It was my father that was helped out of a hole. Not I.”
“You or your father. Doesn’t it come to the same thing?”
“No.”
Charles escorted Mr. Stephen Roquevillard home, and Maurice’s father was left alone with his daughter. Outside the house the light was growing dim. Mist was cloaking the turret and the tower of the archives, as with an evening mantle. The office was filled with the special sadness that comes with the end of a winter’s day. Margaret put another log on the fire.
“I’m glad it’s over,” said her father. “It passed off well, I thought.”