Azuba listened, listened in silence. When her young mistress ceased speaking she shook her head slowly.
“Well,” she observed, “it looks some like hoppin' out of the fryin' pan into the fire, but, even if it turns out that way, perhaps it's just as well to be roasted as fried. Humph! no, 'twon't do to tell anybody. I shan't, and you mustn't.”
“I don't intend to.”
“Um! Not even John Doane?”
“Well,” doubtfully, “I may tell John later on. But I shall wait to tell him, I shan't write. He'll have to trust me, too.”
“So he will. Fur's that goes, it's a good thing for men folks to learn to trust us women. If Labe, my husband, hadn't trusted me all these years, he'd have done some worryin', I cal'late. All right, Gertie, I'm with you till the last plank sinks. But,” with a chuckle, “I'm kind of sorry for your pa. The medicine may cure us all in the end, but it'll be a hard dose for him to take, won't it?”
CHAPTER IX
Captain Dan's foundations were slipping from beneath him. His daughter's return had seemed to him like the first ray of sunshine breaking through the clouds and presaging the end of the storm. Now, it began to look as if the real storm was but beginning. Gertrude was apparently contracting the society and Chapter disease. Gertrude, upon whose good sense and diplomacy he had banked so heavily, was rapidly losing that sense. So far from influencing her mother to give up the “crazy notions” which were, Daniel firmly believed, wrecking their home and happiness, she was actually encouraging and abetting these notions.
The young lady was certainly spending a great deal of time with her mother and her mother's friends. When Mrs. Black and Mrs. Lake called for consultations concerning Chapter affairs, Gertrude took part in these consultations. Daniel, peeping into the library, saw the four heads together over the table, and heard his daughter's voice suggesting this and that. Invitations to various social functions came, and it was Gertrude who urged acceptance of these invitations. Captain Dan's pleas for quiet evenings together at home went for nought.