Mr. Carter laughed.
“Mama can just about say, ‘oui, oui,’ like a pig,” he said bluntly. “You women hurry up; I want my supper.”
Fanchon, with one foot on the stairs, turned and kissed her hand to him.
“I’m coming,” she declared. “I’m starving, too. I won’t be ten minutes!”
“She means two hours,” said William, his eyes following the small figure with a look that did not escape either his father or Daniel.
“She’s turned his head,” the latter thought moodily, not unaware of the charm of the light, hurrying voice and the accent, delicate and sweet, that made her English so exotic.
At the moment, too, Leigh appeared, laden with Fanchon’s luggage. Like a beast of burden he toiled up behind the women, plainly captivated. William, seeing it, grinned and laid his hand on Daniel’s shoulder. Daniel was the only one who had, so far, shown no signs of capitulation.
“Well, Dan, got any of those old cigarettes in your room?” he asked jocularly.
Daniel yielded, returning his smile, and the two brothers, anxious perhaps for a little talk together, went up-stairs.
Left alone—marooned, as it were—on the old Turkey rug in the hall, Mr. Carter prowled about for a moment, his mind in a maze. He looked into the dining-room, wondered if supper was ready, and finally went into the library and sank heavily into his favorite chair. He had a confused feeling of amazement that the room looked just as usual—the same old books around the walls, the same old portrait of an ancestral Carter over the fireplace, and the guttered chairs, looking as homelike and shabby as ever. Even the litter on the table—it hadn’t set itself in order, this corner of the house having escaped the cleaning up for the bride. There was the same old lamp in the center, and his old brier-wood lay there, too.