That, apparently, finished for the present what he had to say.  He turned—­it really was rather gentle the way he disengaged himself from the fixity of John’s look,—­replaced the cushions on the cane davenport; and then, seating himself, began putting on his shoes.

Precisely that gentleness, though it checked on John’s tongue the angry question, “What the devil were you doing with her until early this morning?” only added to his anger by depriving it of a target.  For a minute he sat inarticulate, boiling.

It was an outrageous piece of slacking on Rush’s part that he should have deserted his sister before the arrival of one or the other of his promised reenforcements relieved him of his duty.  It was inexcusable of Lucile to let a trivial matter like a broken spring keep her at Hickory Hill.  There were plenty of trains, weren’t there?  And the third rail every hour?  It was shockingly disengenuous of Mary, when she talked with him over the telephone yesterday afternoon, to have suppressed the essential fact that Rush had already deserted her and that she was at that moment alone.

And then his anger turned upon himself, as a voice within him asked whether, on his conscience, he could affirm that this knowledge would have made a difference in his own actions.  Could he be sure he wouldn’t have clutched at the assurance that his sister was already on the way rather than have exacerbated his quarrel with Paula by doing the one thing that would annoy her most.

Laboriously he got himself together, steadied himself.  “You mustn’t think,” he said, “that I’m not grateful.  We’re all grateful, of course, to you for having done what our combined negligence appears to have made necessary.”  Then his voice hardened and the ring of anger crept into it as he added, “You may be sure that nothing of the sort will occur again.”

“No,” March said dryly.  “It won’t occur again.”  He straightened up and faced John Wollaston squarely.  “I’ve persuaded Mary to marry me,” he said.

“To marry—­you!” John echoed blankly.  For a moment before his mind began to work, he merely stared.  The first thought that struggled through was a reluctant recognition of the fact that there was a sort of dignity in the man which not even the stale look, inevitable about one who has just slept in his clothes, could overcome.  No more than his pallor and the lines of fatigue deeply marked in his face could impeach his air of authority.  There was something to him not quite accountable under any of the categories John was in the habit of applying.  So much John had conceded from the first; from that morning in this very room when he had found him tuning the Circassian grand and had gone away, shutting the door over yonder, so that Paula shouldn’t hear.

But that Mary should seriously contemplate marrying him!  Mary!  Good God!

Once more March disengaged himself from John’s fixed gaze.  Not at all as if he couldn’t support it; gently again, by way of giving the older man time to recover from his astonishment.  He went into the bay and stood looking out the window into the bright hot empty street.  From where he sat John could see his face in profile.  He certainly was damned cool about it.