The Thornburg home was quite as nice, even in the indefinable ways that count most, as any home Baron was acquainted with. There was an impression of elegance—but not too much elegance—in the large reception-room. There was a general impression of softly limited illumination, of fine yet simple furniture. The walls had a kind of pleasant individuality, by reason of the fact that they were sparsely—yet attractively—ornamented.
A grandfather’s clock imparted homeliness to one end of the room; there was a restful suggestion in the broad fireplace in which an enormous fern had been installed. Baron’s glance also took in a grand piano of a quietly subdued finish.
Mrs. Thornburg alone seemed in some odd way out of harmony with the fine, cordial picture in which Baron found her. She was a frail, wistful woman, and because her body was ailing, her mind, too—as Baron speedily discovered—was not of the sound, cheerful texture of her surroundings.
“Ah, Baron!” exclaimed Thornburg, advancing to meet his guest as the latter was shown into the room. “I’m glad to see you here.”
As he turned to his wife, to introduce the visitor, Baron was struck by something cautious and alert in his manner—the manner of a man who must be constantly prepared to make allowances, to take soundings. He presented an altogether wholesome picture as he looked alternately at his wife and his guest. His abundant, stubborn gray hair was in comfortable disorder, to harmonize with the smoking-jacket he wore, and Baron looked at him more than once with the uncomfortable sense of never having really known him before. He thought, too, how this brusque, ruddy man seemed in a strange fashion imprisoned within the radius of an ailing wife’s influence.
“Mr. Baron is the man who carried that little girl out of the theatre the other day,” explained Thornburg. He turned again to Baron with a casual air: “Do you find that your people still want to let her go?”
He was playing a part, obviously; the part of one who is all but indifferent. Mrs. Thornburg scrutinized the visitor’s face closely.
“Yes, I believe they do,” replied Baron.
“I’ve been talking to Mrs. Thornburg about the case. She understands that I feel a sort of responsibility. I think I’ve about persuaded her to have a look at the little girl.”
Mrs. Thornburg seemed unwilling to look at her husband while he was speaking. Baron thought she must be concealing something. She was gazing at him with an expression of reproach, not wholly free from resentment.