"I can't see why,—we never went to him for help!"
She knew that was not exactly the reason,—extravagance. The old man did not like the modern spirit—at least the spirit of so many of her friends—of spending for themselves. The Colonel did not trust the present generation; he preferred that his money should wait until possibly the passing of the years had brought wisdom.
"A selfish will!" the public said.
PART THREE
CHAPTER XXV
Fosdick had called Cornelia Woodyard the "Vampire,"—why, none of her admirers could say. She did not look the part this afternoon, standing before the fire in her library, negligently holding a cup of tea in one hand, while she nibbled gourmandizingly at a frosted cake. She had come in from an expedition with Cairy, and had not removed her hat and gloves, merely letting her furs slip off to the floor. While she had her tea, Cairy was looking through the diamond panes of a bank of windows at a strip of small park, which was dripping in the fog of a dubious December day. Conny, having finished her tea, examined lazily some notes, pushed them back into their envelopes with a disgusted curl of her long lips, and glancing over her shoulder at Cairy drawled in an exhausted voice:—
"Poke the fire, please, Tommy!"
Cairy did as he was told, then lighted a cigarette and stood expectantly. Conny seemed lost in a maze of dreary thoughts, and the man looked about the room for amusement. It was a pleasant little room, with sufficient color of flowers and personal disorderliness of letters and books and papers to soften the severity of the Empire furniture. Evidently the architect who had done over this small down-town house had been supplemented by the strong hand of its mistress. Outside and inside he had done his best to create something French out of the old-fashioned New York block house, but Cornelia Woodyard had Americanized his creation enough to make it intimate, livable.
"Can't you say something, Tommy?" Conny murmured in her childish treble.
"I have said a good deal first and last, haven't I?"