“Of course, if you do not wish for one,” began Jean with great dignity.
“But I do!” cried Margot with immense eagerness and no dignity at all.
“You might, then,” said Jean reproachfully “have said so before.”
Margot hung her head penitently and began to fold up the tablecloth; she hadn’t finished it, but she saw Jean was not in the mood to be kept waiting.
“I think you had better bring your music to my room,” he said, after a pause. “We might disturb your mother.”
Margot flushed. She had not expected Jean to like her mother, but she had hoped that she would not have to see quite so plainly how much he didn’t.
“Very well,” she said simply. She was dressed neatly and prettily, as she always was, and her hair curled over her fresh white forehead; her cheeks were a little less rosy and round, and her eyes looked larger—but this was becoming to her rather than otherwise, and it was perhaps unnecessary for Jean to compare her mentally to Liane, wholly to Margot’s disadvantage.
The truth was that Jean wished to be fascinated by women, not to be mothered by them, and though Margot did try very hard to please him, she did so intermittently and without calculation, because the desire of her heart was to do and be what was best for him; and that was hardly the kind of thing that a man of Jean’s age could be expected to appreciate. Even as Margot followed him into his room her whole being was absorbed in the consideration of how to cook eggs à l’aurore for déjeuner. It was Friday, and Jean had said he hated plain eggs. For three days she had been on tip-toe with desire and expectation for this lesson, and now she was hopelessly absorbed in eggs! She looked at Jean with unintelligent eyes; tomato sauce was so expensive, would not a dash of vinegar in thick brown gravy do as well?
“Mademoiselle,” said Jean, with awful calm, “is this what you call your music?”
“O ciel!” cried Margot in horror, throwing her hands above her head. It was the cookery book; they neither of them laughed!