With a shock that made the glass and silver ring Beeston's fist struck upon the table.
"Silence!" he said.
He did not raise his voice; he did not need to. The word, spoken with a slow, unhurried evenness, the man's usual rumbling monotone, seemed to crash down upon and obliterate Lloyd much as if he had been hit by a landslide. Shamed and conscious he tugged furiously at his pale mustaches, at the same time glancing guiltily at the two menservants. His eyes, when again they returned to his father-in-law, were hard, angry, resentful. But Beeston did not heed.
"Bless Thou, O Lord, this, food to our use; and make humble our hearts within us. Amen." Then, sitting back abruptly, he stretched out a hand to the glass in front of him. "Some of the '88 Canary, Crabbe; I'll have it with my soup."
Bab raised her eyes. She had been aware of Beeston's opinion of his son-in-law; but behind his contemptuous disdain she detected now an impulse she had not known before—a vindictive wrath, a fury only half hidden. Of that tension in the room Bab from the first had been aware, and now she realized Lloyd must have been the cause of it. What had he been doing? Wondering, she was still sitting there, wrapped in silence, when Mrs. Lloyd broke the uncomfortable pause. About Mrs. Lloyd's bored, impassive voice there was often a sort of disdainful, purring inflection that Bab heard with disquiet. Ordinarily it signaled something disagreeable. Turning to Miss Elvira, Mrs. Lloyd smiled vaguely.
"You haven't told me yet—has that card been sent?"
"What card?" Miss Elvira looked up sharply. Then almost at the same instant she seemed to comprehend. "The card to—to—— You mean the one we were talking about?" Her air was obviously uneasy. Beeston, too, seemed interested, for his eye lighted and he glanced sideways at his daughter. Mrs. Lloyd was still smiling vaguely.
"Yes," she returned, "the card for that young man. I'm curious to learn whether he would accept."
Miss Elvira did not reply. In frosty silence she busied herself about the tea-urn; but as Bab sat listening, her interest mildly awakened, she saw Miss Elvira glance swiftly toward her, then away, a signal evidently for the benefit of Mrs. Lloyd. But Mrs. Lloyd, it seemed, had some purpose behind her veiled, vague speeches. She, too, cast a glance at Bab.
"I suggest we send the invitation. At the most he could only refuse. If he accepted we might by chance learn his true attitude toward us."