It took him some time to recover, and during the entire time she sat in
her gray shawl, looking very amiable, but plainly unable to think of
anything to say.
"I saw your son in Farron's office to-day."
"Mr. Farron has been so kind, so wonderfully kind!"
Only a guilty conscience could have found reproach in this statement, and
Lanley said:
"And I hear he is dining at my daughter's this evening."
Mrs. Wayne had had a telephone message to that effect.
"I wondered, if you were alone--" Lanley hesitated. He had of course been
going to ask her to come and dine with him, but a better inspiration came
to him. "I wondered if you would ask me to dine with you."
"Oh, I'm so sorry," said Mrs. Wayne, "but I can't. I have a boy coming.
He's studying for the ministry, the most interesting person. He had not
been sober for three years when I took hold of him, and now he hasn't
touched a drop for two."
He sighed. She said she was sorry, but he could see plainly enough that
any reformed, or even more any unreformed, drunkard would always far
surpass him in ability to command her interest. He did not belong to a
generation that cleared things up with words; he would have thought it
impertinent, almost ungentlemanly, to probe her attitude of mind about
the scene at Adelaide's; and he would have considered himself unmanly to
make any plea to her on the ground of his own suffering. One simply
supported such things as best one could; it was expected of one, like
tipping waiters.
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