“To-morrow.”
“And Stanton—what is he going to do?”
“Marry me and go too.”
“Oh this is delicious,” said Judy clasping her around the waist. “I never dreamed of this. Oh I will be good. I shall never get out of temper now,” and she sidled in ecstasy up and down the hall.
“My father will accompany us, I hope,” said Vivienne. “I wish never to separate from him again. I must go to see him now, the beloved martyr. I can scarcely believe that he is here; so many wonderful things have happened to-night. My head is in a whirl.”
“Don’t go,” said Judy detaining her. "Mamma gave him the best room in the house, where he has, I hope, quietly gone to sleep. You will see him in a few hours; let us talk some more about England and your marriage. I don’t understand perfectly yet. Things have been so rushed that I am confused. Will you explain to me about your father? I thought Uncle Colonel liked him. Why did he wish to get rid of him?”[him?”]
“Dear Judy,” and Vivienne drew the girl to a seat beside her, “it seems to me that all the trouble and all the comfort in the world comes through women. You know sometimes men love the women they should not. It is a shocking thing to say, but my father tells me that Colonel Armour loved my mother better than he has ever loved any person in the world.”
“Shocking indeed,” said Judy, “in plain English, brutal; for I suppose in liking her, his first thought was to get rid of your father.”
“Yes, he wished to ruin him, to bring about a separation between him and my mother, and he hoped that my father, being of a sensitive nature, would take his own life, and my mother being proud and hating treachery, would despise his memory and marry him.”
“The old wretch!”