In fact, Emily had almost to acknowledge to herself that Eve had certain traits that Martha might well have had. Bob, of course, talked about them openly. Eve had a proper attitude towards her father, for one thing. She had said, quite naturally, that her dad was a lamb, a perfect duck, and a good old sport. And the fourth evening she had been at Emily's, the four of them, with another girl, Johnnie Benton, and another lad of the town, had been sitting on the veranda, waiting for the third lad to come in his car, so that the six of them could drive over to the lake to dance. They had heard some one come in, and called to him to come out, thinking it was the dilatory sixth. And Eve's father had come out to them.
Bob couldn't get over that scene. Eve had sprung up and hugged him and kissed him and patted him. Emily, seeing even that greeting, would have been sure that Eve's rather shocking sophistication was only a pose. For she had started at once to get her things together to go home with him. And when Johnnie Benton had protested she had turned to him indignantly. "I like your nerve!" she had cried to him. "Do you suppose I'm going to a dance with you when I haven't seen my dad for six weeks?" And she wouldn't go. They couldn't persuade her. Bob, sitting there, had seen her father relishing the situation. The man obviously overflowed with pride in his "Evelyn."
"Now, can you beat that?" Bob had demanded of Emily afterwards. "Can you imagine Martha cutting a dance for me? Maybe Eve'll do her some good. Can you beat that?"
Emily couldn't possibly imagine Martha preferring her father to a dance, or to very much else. But she wouldn't acknowledge it.
"Oh, well, Bob, that's another matter. It was sweet, the way she did it. But Eve hadn't seen him for weeks. And then, she hasn't got a mother. She's had to depend on him always. It's much more normal, I must say, for a girl to prefer a dance to her parents. You can't deny that."
"I know it. But it's the principle of the thing." And he had liked Eve, till he had met her coming from the bathroom in what he called, "an obscene Mother Hubbard."
And now, getting ready for supper, Emily wished she knew why Eve had, once, mentioned father-in-law in connection with Wilton. Bob would have laughed at her, if he had known, for she thought every man in town was in love with Martha, he said. A fat chance she had of getting near her as hard-headed a man as Wilton. He had too much sense to fall for any such kid as Martha, Bob had assured her. But how could she help thinking about it when Wilton's father had told her that he absolutely refused to leave his hospital work to come home for any dance? He was interned already, by what he called a streak of luck, but Emily knew it was rather his ability. And now he was coming out to see Martha—and his father was a barber. How could a mother help thinking about her child's matrimonial possibilities, a lovely girl of that age? "When I was her age," thought Emily, "I fell in love with Jim." And it was because she had been thinking of the possibility, any time now, of Martha's marriage, that she had tolerated the painted room.
One thing Emily Kenworthy was sure of. She had almost gritted her teeth in the intensity of her resolutions on this subject for years, whenever she had had to think over the surprising course of her own life. She had married really to get out of this very house, made intolerable to her by the tyranny of her aunt. But her daughter wouldn't ever marry to get away from her. She would never marry for freedom! Not while Emily Kenworthy knew what she was doing! Emily had few strong convictions, but that one was unalterable.
Emily loved every meal when Martha was home. That evening at supper she sat cherishing her enjoyment. Afterwards it was so amusing to be running in and out of the painted room, where Eve and Martha were dressing. No sooner had they gone up to dress, ready for the evening, than Martha called to her from the bathroom, above the noise of water steaming into the tub:
"Mother!"