“What do you think David is saying to Myrtle now?” he asked drily.  “I am glad, Caroline; everything worked out straight for you.  David is a damned good Quaker.  For some others life isn’t so easy.”  She laid a warm hand on his shoulder.  “I wish you were happy, Howat.”  A slight irritation seized him at the facile manner in which she radiated her satisfaction, and he moved away.  “David’s going back to-night.  I wish he wouldn’t,” she said troubled.  “That long, dark way.  Anything might happen.  But he has simply got to be at his father’s office in the morning.  He is going to speak to him first, see what will be given us at the Furnace.”

“It should be quite a family party at breakfast,” Howat predicted.

VII

He was entirely right.  Ludowika rarely appeared so early; Myrtle’s face seemed wan and pinched, and her father rallied her on her indisposition after what should have been an entrancing evening.  She declared suddenly, “I hate David Forsythe!” Gilbert Penny was obviously startled.  Caroline half rose, as if she had finished breakfast; but she sat down again with an expression of determination.  Howat looted about from his removed place of being.  “I do!” Myrtle repeated.  “At first he seemed to like—­I mean I liked him, and then everything changed, got horrid.  Some one interfered.”  Resentment, suspicion, dominated her, she grew shrill with anger.  “I saw him making faces at Howat, as if he and Howat, as if Howat had, well—­”

“Don’t generalize,” said Howat coolly; “be particular.”

“As if you had deliberately spoiled any chance, yes,” she declared defiantly, “any chance I had.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Gilbert Penny declared.  “What,” he asked his wife, “are they all driving at?” She professed herself equally puzzled.  “Howat would say nothing disadvantageous to young Forsythe.  He knows what we all hope.”  Caroline suddenly leaned forward, speaking in a level voice:  “This has nothing to do with Howat, but with me.  I am going to tell you at once, so that you can all say what you wish, get as angry as you like, and then accept what—­what had to be.  David and I love each other; we are going to be married.”

Gilbert Penny’s surprise slowly gave place to a dark tide suffusing his countenance.  “You and David,” he half stuttered, “getting married—­like that.”  Myrtle was rigid in an indignation that left her momentarily without speech.  Mrs. Penny, Howat saw, drew into the slight remoteness from which she watched the conflicts of her family.  “I know I’m fearfully bold, yes, indecent,” Caroline went on, “and undutiful, impertinent.  I’m sorry, truly, for that.  Perhaps you’ll forgive me, later.  But I won’t apologize for loving David.”

“Incredible,” her father pronounced.  “A girl announcing, without the slightest warrant or authority, that she intends to marry.  And trampling on her sister’s heart in the bargain.”  Howat expostulated, “What does it matter which he marries?  The main affair is to consolidate the families.”  The elder glared at him.  “Be silent!” he commanded.  Howat Penny’s ever present resentment rose to the surface.  “I am not a girl,” he stated; “nor yet a nigger.  And, personally, I think David was extremely wise.”