Bab in wonder obeyed. To be inspected, to be looked over, appraised and then admired may perhaps be the object all women have when they array themselves in all the allurement of their dress. But what an inspection this was! Not even in her last survey before the mirror had she given herself a closer, a more critical scrutiny.
"Turn round!" directed Beeston.
Bab turned.
"Now turn the other way!"
Again she turned. Her head poised, wondering, she watched him over her shoulder. Beeston had bent forward now, both his gnarled hands clasped upon his stick, and under their heavy lids his somber eyes pored over her. What his motive was in looking her over like that she had not the faintest notion. Then of a sudden Beeston spoke.
"Huh!" he said, his tone a half-contemptuous growl. "Good-looking, you are, aren't you! A handsome piece, and healthy and strong too! Yes, that's what you are!" Then with a sudden movement, surprising in its swiftness, he bent over and tapped her on the arm. "Lucky for you!" he said. "Lucky for you!" The words still on his lips, he indicated the library door. "Davy's in there. You go to him, you hear?" The next instant he was gone, calling as he stamped along the hall: "Crabbe, Crabbe, come give me an arm up the stairs!"
David, too, had come down early. Since the beginning of the spring, the time when the Lloyds had moved out to their place on Long Island, he had had a room for himself at his grandfather's. Ordinarily the country appealed far more to David than the town, but of late, for various reasons, he seemed to have changed his preference. Bab found him now in the library, his chin upon his hands, a book opened on his knees. The scene with Beeston, an incident as astonishing as it was inexplicable, had left her uncomfortable; but at the sight of David all Bab's animation returned at a bound. Leaning over, she slipped the book away from him.
"Silly!"
"Oh, hello!"
His air as he looked up was bewildered, and again she laughed.