Mrs. Baron gazed at her son silently, her face darkening. He realized that her mind was filled with scorn, with resistance, with misgivings. “And I suppose,” she said, “that everything in their house is the newest and brightest and costliest!” She enumerated these qualities as if she were pointing out so many of the cardinal sins.
Baron pretended not to understand. “They live nicely,” he said. “But as far as Bonnie May is concerned, I don’t think you need fear that the things the Thornburgs have will give them any advantage over us.”
“Well, I don’t want her to go,” declared Mrs. Baron.
Baron was standing in indecision when, happily, there was an interruption.
The front door closed rather noisily, as it did when Mrs. Shepard was not in a very good humor, and there was the sound of Baggot’s voice in the hall.
Baron groaned. He had forgotten about Baggot. He went out into the hall and confronted the playwright apologetically. “I’d really forgotten,” he began, but Baggot cut him short.
“It’s all right,” remarked that young man. “Come on up to the library. I needn’t keep you long. But it’s simply necessary—” He was leading the way up-stairs as if he were in his own house.
“Look here, Baggot,” remonstrated Baron, “I’ve got to go out to-night, in half an hour—in fifteen minutes. You’ll have to come back some other night.”
“Where you going?”
Baron gasped at the man’s rudeness.