“She doesn’t even much like the guy.”
“That’s neither here nor there!” Mrs. Bailey talked on, persuasively. “A woman learns to like a man, Beau. Most women at first hate the men they marry, for a while. Though for a girl with all her looks and education to remain so innocent is something I don’t get!”
“You shouldn’t judge everybody by—”
“My background,” she cut in, “is something we do not discuss. Now, Beau—you’ve got—you’ve absolutely got to do something yourself about this gambling debt. We can’t possibly afford to have Lenore’s chances—with Kit Sloan, for Lord’s sake— ruined, because some petty racketeer disgraces you! All you need to do is something temporary. Something that would hold the fort, until Lenore could get—”
“Get what exactly? Disgraced herself?”
“Now, Beau. This is the twentieth century, not the Victorian Age. You’ve got to be realistic.”
“Listen, Net. I’m not going to let my daughter haul me out of this by making herself into a tramp.”
“What I’m asking is, are you going to stand in her way of making what might be a brilliant—and happy—marriage? A marriage that would move you into a real house in, maybe, the Cold Spring section, with five cars and half a dozen servants, able”—she was perfectly aware of his desires and weaknesses—” to run down to Miami in the winter, to take in the New Orleans Mardi Gras, to join the boys at every good convention, instead of going once in five years—”
“Fat chance!” he replied peevishly. “The last time I came home from a convention and you found that lipstick on my—That was my last convention!”
“Why, Beau? Ask yourself why? Because we can’t afford that sort of thing. We can’t afford luxury living. You can’t afford to date blondes! Your social position can’t stand it! Your job is endangered by it. Don’t you realize everything would be utterly different, if the Sloans and the Baileys had a hyphen between the two names, owing to Lenore?”