"You are living here?"
"Yes; I am working on the new dam, a few miles from this place."
"I am so glad to see you again," Isabelle said, the only words she could think of.
"Thank you."
Then with a curt nod he was off. He had not shown in any way that he was glad to see her, Isabelle reflected. Falkner was always moody, but she had thought he liked her,—and after all their friendship! Something had kept her from asking more about Bessie.
CHAPTER XXXI
Larry did not return for dinner, which Isabelle ate by herself in sombre silence. When she went upstairs to take the mother's place with the boy, Margaret did not seem to notice her husband's absence, though she inquired repeatedly whether the New York doctor had telephoned. Later in the evening when Isabelle suggested that some effort should be made to find the boy's father, Margaret exclaimed impatiently:—
"I can't tell where he is! … It is easier for me that he isn't here." And in answer to Isabelle's expression, she added: "Don't look so shocked, B! Larry gets on my nerves frightfully when there is anything extra to bear or do. Of course I shall telephone his office in the morning, and he will come out at once. That doctor said there would be no change before morning. Do you suppose he knows anything, that doctor? He had the look of polite ignorance!"
The New York doctor arrived towards midnight with a nurse, and stayed the night to await developments. Margaret still sat by the boy's bed, and Isabelle left her huddled in a large chair, her eyes staring at the shadow on the faintly lighted bed. She had listened to what Dr. Rogers had to say without a word. She was almost stone, Isabelle felt, looking at her with some awe. What could have made her like this!
She was still in this stony mood the next morning when Larry reached the house. Dressed in a loose black gown that clung to her slight figure and brought out the perfect whiteness of her skin, she stood and listened indifferently to the vague explanation of his absence that her husband poured out profusely. Then with a remark that the doctor would see him before he went, she left the room. Isabelle, who was present, watched the two keenly, trying to divine the secret. To be sure, Larry was not attractive, she decided,—too effusive, too anxious to make the right impression, as if he were acting a part before Isabelle, and full of wordy concern for every one. A little below the medium height, he stood very erect, consciously making the most of his inches. His sandy hair was thin, and he wore glasses, behind which one eye kept winking nervously. Neatly, almost fashionably dressed, he bore no evident marks of dissipation. After Conny's description, Isabelle had expected to see his shortcomings written all over him. Though he was over-mannered and talkative, there was nothing to mark him as of the outcast class. "One doesn't despise one's husband because he's foolish or unfortunate about money matters," Isabelle said to herself. And the sympathy that she had felt for Margaret began to evaporate.