Hearing Pete coming, he set the photograph back in its place, and, sitting down, picked up the first paper within reach.

“Good night, sir,” said Pete from the doorway.

“Good night, my dear boy.  Good luck!” They shook hands.

“Funny old duck,” Pete thought as he went down-stairs whistling, “sitting there so contentedly reading ‘The Harvard Lampoon.’  Wonder what he thinks of it.”

He did not wonder long, though, for more interesting subjects of consideration were at hand.  What reception would he meet at the Farrons?  What arrangements would be made, what assumptions permitted?  But even more immediate than this was the problem how could he contrive to greet Mrs. Farron?  He was shocked to find how little he had been able to forgive her.  There was something devilish, he thought, in the way she had contrived to shake his self-confidence at the moment of all others when he had needed it.  He could never forget a certain contemptuous curve in her fine, clear profile or the smooth delight of her tone at some of her own cruelties.  Some day he would have it out with her when the right moment came.  Before he reached the house he had had time to sketch a number of scenes in which she, caught extraordinarily red-handed, was forced to listen to his exposition of the evil of such methods as hers.  He would say to her, “I remember that you once said to me, Mrs. Farron—­” Anger cut short his vision as a cloud of her phrases came back to him, like stinging bees.

He had hoped for a minute alone with Mathilde, but as Pringle opened the drawing-room door for him he heard the sound of laughter, and seeing that even Mrs. Farron herself was down, he exclaimed quickly: 

“What, am I late?”

Every one laughed all the more at this.

“That’s just what Mr. Farron said you would say at finding that Mama was dressed in time,” exclaimed Mathilde, casting an admiring glance at her stepfather.

“You’d suppose I’d never been in time for dinner before,” remarked Adelaide, giving Wayne her long hand.

“But isn’t it wonderful, Pete,” put in Mathilde, “how Mr. Farron is always right?”

“Oh, I hope he isn’t,” said Adelaide; “for what do you think he has just been telling me—­that you’d always hate me, Pete, as long as you lived.  You see,” she went on, the little knot coming in her eyebrows, “I’ve been telling him all the things I said to you yesterday.  They did sound rather awful, and I think I’ve forgotten some of the worst.”

“I haven’t,” said Pete.

“I remember I told you you were no one.”

“You said I was a perfectly nice young man.”

“And that you had no business judgment.”

“And that I was mixing Mathilde up with a fraud.”

“And that I couldn’t see any particular reason why she cared about you.”

“That you only asked that your son-in-law should be a person.”