Then she subsided, almost weak with laughter at her own joke, beside a righteously irritated Joan.
"Nearly had the cheek to follow us, mind you," she told her, amid gasps; "properly smitten, he was."
"I wish you had not called out to him," said Joan stiffly. "It is so—so undignified."
Fanny quelled her laughter and looked up at Joan. "Undignified," she repeated; "it stopped him from coming, anyway. You don't look at things the right way, honey. One must not be disagreeable or rude to men in our trade, but one can often choke them off by laughing at them."
CHAPTER XX
| "Love lent is mortal, lavished, is divine. Not by its intake is love's fount supplied, But by the ceaseless outrush of its tide." |
"And there is little Dickie," Mabel said; she stood, one hand on the cot, her grey eyes lowered—"he has brought such happiness into my life that sometimes I am afraid."
The baby. Some women were like that, Dick knew. A child could build anew their world for them and make it radiant with a heaven-sent wonder. He had never thought of Mabel as a mother. He had been almost afraid to meet her after two years away—her letters had given him no clue to her feelings; but then she rarely wrote of herself and she had never been the sort of person to complain. So he had come down to Sevenoaks rather wondering what he would find, remembering their last talk together the day before her wedding. Mabel had met him at the station and driven him back to the house in their car. She had talked chiefly about himself; was he glad to be back?—had he enjoyed the years away?—what plans had he made for the future? But her face, her quiet grey eyes had spoken for her. He knew she was happy, only the reason, the foundation of this happiness, had been a mystery to him until this moment.
"Little Dickie," he repeated, leaning forward to peer at the small atom of humanity who lay fast asleep. "You have called it after me, then?"