“Wait until you’re in love!” warned Billie.
“Yes, I’ll wait,” responded his hostess, briskly. “A woman who has had my luck would be an ungrateful wretch if she permitted herself to become entangled again. Why, it isn’t one woman in ten who marries for money whose husband dies in two years. No wonder I’ve clung to deep mourning. It’s an expression of thankfulness—of the warmest gratitude on my part. No one can say of me, Billie, that I do not realize my blessings!”
Mr. Scott rose and tried to kiss Jane’s hand, but she put it determinedly behind her.
“Respect my mourning, my child,” she said, rebukingly.
After Mr. Scott had taken his departure, she ordered two suit cases packed, gave orders to her two servants about the care of the apartment during her absence, and telegraphed a lengthy message to the Willoughbys.
CHAPTER III.
It was a glorious May day. Jane, whose sound digestion and general superlatively good health enabled her always to front life genially, even when she was most convinced that it was nothing but a heartless farce, was in rollicking spirits. She let Johnson, Billie’s chauffeur, take full charge of the car, while she lay back luxuriously, humming snatches of gay song or planning fresh audacities that would humble the proud spirit of the Willoughbys. But silence for any length of time when there was somebody to talk to was always irksome to Jane.
“You have heard of Elijah, of course?” she observed, presently, to the smug-faced driver.
“Mrs. Carruth’s man, mum?” he asked, stolidly.
“Goodness, no, Johnson!” exclaimed Jane, in a horrified voice. “Though, really”—judiciously—“if Polly insists on his keeping up that awful pace with her car, I think he, too, will go to heaven in a chariot of fire. But”—this to the chauffeur—“I was not referring to Mrs. Carruth’s man, Elihu, but to Elijah, a Bible character. Don’t you”—severely—“read your Bible, Johnson?”