Lois had dominated the scene from the moment of her appearance. Her entrance had been the more startling by reason of its very simplicity. She was taking everything as a matter of course, quite as though there were nothing extraordinary in the parting of the waters to afford her passage dry shod, through those sixteen years, to a promised land imaginably represented by Montgomery. Her sisters, huddled by the center table, struggled against their impotence to seize the situation. This was not their idea of the proper return of a woman who had sinned against Heaven, to say nothing of the house of Montgomery. Their course was the more difficult by reason of their ignorance of the cause of her descent upon them. Amzi should suffer for this; but first she must be dealt with; and they meant to deal with her. Their rage surged the more hotly as they saw their husbands' quick capitulation. They, too, should be dealt with!
"Let us all sit down and be comfortable," said Lois easily, and Hastings and Fosdick bumped heads in their mad haste to place a chair for her.
Hastings, with his theatric instincts stimulated, and realizing that silence would give the massed artillery of the enemy a chance to thunder, immediately engaged the newcomer in conversation. Paris and its theaters served admirably as a theme. Lois clearly knew her Paris well; and she had met Rostand—at a garden party—and spoke of the contemporaneous French drama with the light touch of sophistication. French phrases slipped from her tongue trippingly, and added to her charm and mystery, her fellowship with another and wider world. From Hastings she turned to embrace them all in her talk. The immobile countenances of her sisters, reflecting stubborn resentment and antagonism, were without effect upon her. Instead of sitting before them as the villainess of this domestic drama, a culprit arraigned for her manifold wickednesses, she was beyond question the heroine of the piece.
"You remember, Fanny, what a hard business we used to make of our French? Well, in Seattle I had a lot of time on my hands and I put in a good deal of it studying languages. There was a wonderful Frenchwoman out there and I got her to teach me,—all good fun, with her; we used to go places together, and I finally reached the point where I could talk back to a French waiter. I really believe I could set up as a teacher now without being indicted for taking money under false pretenses. You have been over, haven't you, Kate? It seems to me I heard of your being there; but you might all have gone round the world a dozen times! Whose children are those out there? Bring them in and let me have a look at them."
The children were brought in by their fathers and presented without any interruption to her flow of talk. She let fall a question here and there that was presumably directed to one or the other of her sisters, but their faint, reluctant answers apparently did not disturb her. She was treating them as though they were dingy frumps; and they revolted against all this prattle about Paris. It was distinctly unbecoming in a woman whose sins were so grievous to ripple on so light-heartedly about the unholiest of cities when they sat there as jurors waiting to hear her plea for mercy.
"Susan, you dear angel, come here!"
Susie toddled into her aunt's arms, raised a face that stickily testified to her Uncle Amzi's plentiful provision of candy, and was kissed. Mrs. Waterman, formulating a plan of campaign, took a step toward Susan as though to save the child from this desecration of its innocence; but a glance from Amzi gave her pause.
"Oo have booful clothes. Whas oor name?"
"I'm a new aunt; I'm your Aunt Lois. You never heard of me, did you? Well, it doesn't matter the tiniest little bit. Something tells me that we're going to get on famously. I shouldn't wonder, I shouldn't wonder at all, Susan, if we became the best of friends."
Her voice softened into new and charming tones. She held the sticky, chubby hands unmindfully. She was one of those women who are incapable of an awkward attitude. The child lingered, examining with wide-eyed scrutiny the enchantments of the new lady's apparel.