Isabel fidgeted in her chair and nervously tapped the edge of her plate with her fork. "I haven't heard anybody say," she began, with the air of one scoring a fine point, "that his father doesn't love him, and yet he hasn't gone near him—hasn't even seen him since we were hurt. If Colonel Kent can stay away from him, I don't know why I can't."
The argument seemed unanswerable, for neither Madame nor Rose spoke.
They sat with averted eyes until the silence became oppressive, and
Isabel, with ostentatious difficulty, pushed back her chair and limped
painfully out of the room.
When she had locked her own door, she was more at ease, and began to survey her unpleasant situation. Nobody seemed to consider her at all— it was only Allison, and everything and everybody, apparently, must be sacrificed for him. Just because she had promised to marry him, when he had both hands, they wanted her to go on with it, in spite of the fact that he saw it was impossible.
Isabel sighed heavily. Nobody knew how keenly disappointed she was. She had written to her few friends, told them about her engagement ring, the plans made for her trousseau, the promised touring car, and the brilliant social career that lay before her as the wife of a famous violinist.
She pictured a triumphal tour from city to city, with the leaders of fashion everywhere vying with each other in entertaining them—or, at least, her. It would, of course, be necessary for Allison to play occasionally in the evening and they would miss a great deal on that account, but her days would be free, and she could cancel all her own social obligations by complimentary tickets and suppers after the concerts.
She had planned it all as she took lazy stitches in her dainty lingerie. Aunt Francesca and Rose had been helping her, but the whole thing had stopped suddenly. It seemed rather selfish of them not to go on with it, for lingerie was always useful, and even though she should not marry Allison, it was not at all improbable that she would marry someone else.
If she could find anybody who had plenty of money and would be good to her, she knew that she would encounter no parental opposition, in spite of Mrs. Ross's pronounced views upon the slavery of matrimony.
Allison had been very decent in releasing her from her awkward predicament. He had even arranged it so that no answer was necessary and she need not even see him again. She had the natural shrinking of the healthy young animal from its own stricken kind. It would be much nicer not to see him again.
But, if he could write letters now, it would not be long before he would be able to come over, though his hand had not yet been taken off. It was too bad, for everything had been very pleasant until the accident. She had missed Allison's daily visits and had probably lost the touring car, though as she had taken pains to find out, it had fallen into the ditch and had been injured very little.
Aunt Francesca and Rose had been queer ever since it happened. After Colonel Kent and the servants and the twins had lifted Allison out of "The Yellow Peril" and carried him up to his own room on an improvised stretcher, while someone else was telephoning for every doctor in the neighbourhood, the twins had taken her home. She had insisted upon their helping her up the steps, and as soon as Aunt Francesca and Rose heard the news, they had paid no attention to her at all, but, with one voice, had demanded that the twins should take them to Kent's immediately.