"I won't be here, you see. I'm going to the theatre--Mr. Avery's getting up a party."
Mrs. Heth showed as much surprise as the jubilation of her countenance could accommodate.
"Why, my dear child! Break it, of course! I'll telephone him myself--a friend from out of town--"
"But I don't want to break it, you see!" said Carlisle, laughing brightly. "He can't expect to drop in after months and months and find us all twirling our thumbs on the doorstep, you know!"
"But you're engaged to him.'"
"I should hope not!... Why, mamma! You must think I'm frightfully--die-away!... I'm disciplining him, don't you see? I'm not going to make it too easy for him!"
"Oh!... I see!"
Perhaps she did not see exactly, and certainly she did not believe in manufacturing sporting chances in the most momentous matter in the world. But then neither did Cally, she well knew; and of her daughter's victorious skill in the matter of managing men, she had had many proofs, and now this crowning one. Lovers' coynesses mattered little in the face of the supreme fact of Canning's return.
"Well! You'll give him the whole day to-morrow, of course!... And don't you be too hard on the dear fellow, Cally. His coming back shows he's been disciplined.... How the cats will open their eyes!"
"Probably.... But don't worry about Hugo, mamma. He'll do just what I say after this."