The old man resolved to yield. That very afternoon he drove out to Winetka along the lake shore. He had himself gotten up in his stiffest best. He held the reins high and tight, his body erect in the approved form; while now and then he glanced back to see if the footmen were as rigid as my lady demanded. For Mrs. Stuart loved good form, and he felt nervously apprehensive, as if he were again suing for her maiden favors. He was conscious, too, that he had little enough to offer her—the last months had brought humility. Beside him young Spencer lolled, enjoying, with a free heart, his day off in the gentle, spring-like air. Perhaps he divined that his lady would not need so much propitiation.
They surprised a party just setting forth from the Winetka house as they drove up with a final flourish. Their unexpected arrival scattered the guests into little, curious groups; everyone anticipated immediate dissolution. They speculated on the terms, and the opinion prevailed that Stuart's expedition from town indicated complete surrender. Meanwhile Stuart asked for an immediate audience, and husband and wife went up at once to Mrs. Stuart's little library facing out over the bluff that descended to the lake.
"Well, Beatty," old Stuart cried, without preliminary effort, "I just can't live without you—that's the whole of it." She smiled. "I ain't much longer to live, and then you're to have it all. So why shouldn't you take what you want now?" He drew out several checks from his pocket-book.
"You can cable your folks at once and go ahead. You've been the best sort of wife, as you said, and—I guess I owe you more'n I've paid for your puttin' up with an old fellow like me all these years."
Mrs. Stuart had a new sensation of pity for his pathetic surrender.
"There's one thing, Beatty," he continued, "so long as I live you'll own I oughter rule in my own house, manage the boys, and that." Mrs. Stuart nodded. "Now I want you to come back with me and break up this party."
Mrs. Stuart took the checks.
"You've made it a bargain, Beatty. You said I was to pay your family what you wanted, and you were to obey me at that price?"
"Well," replied Mrs. Stuart, good-humoredly. "We'll all go up to-morrow. Isn't that early enough?"
"That ain't all, Beatty. You can't make everybody over; you couldn't brush me up much; you can't make a grand lady out of Edith."