"Suggestions and advice are foolish things to give, Catherine. They are seldom taken, never thanked for."
"Well, in this case mine have been actually solicited. And I feel I ought to do something, because, in a way, I'm more or less responsible for the—the imbroglio."
Slipping her hand through his arm, she led him back into the library.
"You see, it's this way. Perhaps, after all, it will be better, simpler, if I don't try to beat about the bush. Amy Pelham has been terribly devoted to Mr. Van Brandt for ever so long—oh, quite six months. And he has been rather attentive, though I can't say he struck me as very much in love. You know she asked me out to Tuxedo not long ago. She wanted me to watch him and tell her if I thought he was serious. Well, I watched him, but I couldn't say I thought he was serious. However, you never can tell. Men are so extraordinary! They sometimes masquerade so, their own mothers wouldn't know them."
"Or their sisters."
"What did you say?"
"Nothing worth repeating. Go on with your story."
"Well, then, one evening she brought him here, you remember. I'd asked him to come, when I was in Tuxedo, and he evidently wanted to do so, for he proposed to Amy that she bring him. Of course, I'd no idea he and Miss Lang had ever met before, and when I innocently ordered her in, I did it simply because Radcliffe was refractory and refused to come without her, and I couldn't have a scene before guests."
"Well?"
"I didn't know Mr. Van Brandt came from Grand Rapids. How should I? One never thinks of those little, provincial towns as having any society."