“Upstairs in my room, smoking.”
“Smoking! I thought he’d promised her solemnly not to.”
“Yes, he did; but he says he doesn’t care a—red apple; he’s going to have some comfort out of the day. I’ve left him with a box of cigars; good ones, too. He’s having the time of his life.”
“O—o—h!” said Mrs. Belmore with the rapt expression of one who sees beyond the veil. When she spoke it was with impressive slowness. “When you hear me come downstairs with Edith and go in the parlor, you wait a moment and then bring him down—with his cigar—into the library. Do you understand?”
“No,” said Mr. Belmore.
“Oh, Herbert! If she sees him smoking—! There’s no time to lose, for I have to get tea to-night. When I call you, leave him and come at once, do you hear? Don’t stop a minute—just come, before they get a chance to follow.”
“You bet I’ll come,” said Mr. Belmore, “like a bird to its—I will, really, petty.”
That he nearly knocked her down by his wildly tragic rush when she called from the back hall—“Herbert, please come at once! I can’t turn off the water,” was a mere detail—they clung to each other in silent laughter, behind the enshrouding porti—res, not daring to move. The footfall of the deserted Edith was heard advancing from the front room to the library, and her clear and solemn voice, as of one actuated only by the lofty dictates of duty, penetrated distinctly to the listeners.
“Alan Wilson, is it possible that you are smoking? Have you broken your promised word?”
“Well, they’re at it, at last,” said Mr. Belmore, relapsing into a chair in the kitchen with a sigh of relief, and drawing a folded newspaper from his pocket. “I wouldn’t be in his shoes for a farm.”