“Any danger?” His first thought, of course, was of Kurt.
“Don't try to talk now. Come when you can.”
III
So Lanny rather stinted the Armenians, and maybe let more of them die. So many poor peasants were dying, in so many parts of the world — there came a time when one just gave up. He omitted from his report some of the Armenian charges and some of the Turkish admissions, and slipped into his big trench coat, ran downstairs, and hopped into a taxi.
His fair blond mother was waiting in one of those bright-colored silk dressing gowns from China — this time large golden dragons crawling clockwise round her. She had taken to smoking under the strain of the past year, and evidently had done it a lot, for the air in the room was hazy and close. Beauty deserved her name almost as much as formerly, and never more so than when tenderness and concern were in her sweet features. After opening her door she looked into the passage to see if anyone had followed her son, then led him into her boudoir before she spoke.
“Lanny, I met Kurt at Emily's!”
“Oh, my God!” exclaimed the youth.
“The first person I saw, standing at her side.”
“Does she know who he is?”
“She thinks he's a musician from Switzerland.”