“I don’t suppose that he would care much whether you played the piano or not; or that you would care much, my dear, what he thought.”
“For all that, papa,” said Frances, recovering herself, “it is a little interesting to know there is somebody, even if he is not at all what one thought. Where does he live, and what is his name? That will give me one little landmark in England, where there is none now.”
“Not a very reasonable satisfaction,” said her father lazily, but without any other reply. “In my life, I have always found relations a nuisance. Happy are they who have none; and next best is to cast them off and do without them. As a matter of fact, it is every one for himself in this world.”
Frances was silenced, though not convinced. She looked with some anxiety at the outline of her father’s spare and lengthy figure laid out in the basket-chair, one foot moving slightly, which was a habit he had, the whole extended in perfect rest and calm. He was not angry, he was not disturbed. The questions which she had put with so much mental perturbation had not affected him at all. She felt that she might dare further without fear.
“When I was out to-day,” she said, faltering a little, “I met—that gentleman again.”
“Ah!” said Mr Waring—no more; but he ceased to shake his foot, and turned towards her the merest hair’s-breadth, so little that it was impossible to say he had moved, and yet there was a change.
“And the lady,” said Frances, breathless. “I am sure they wanted to be kind. They asked me a great many questions.”
He gave a faint laugh, but it was not without a little quiver in it. “What a good thing that you could not answer them!” he said.
“Do you think so, papa? I was rather unhappy. It looked as if you could not trust me. I should have been ashamed to say I did not know; which is the truth—for I know nothing, not so much as where I was born!” cried the girl. “It is very humiliating, when you are asked about your own father, to say you don’t know. So I said it was time for breakfast, and you would be waiting; and ran away.”
“The best thing you could have done, my dear. Discretion in a woman, or a girl, is always the better part of valour. I think you got out of it very cleverly,” Mr Waring said.