“But the time!” he protested.  “I shall need every hour between now and to-morrow night!”

“One clear-headed hour is worth a dozen muddled ones.  You do as I say.”

“I hate drugs,” he said, rising again.

“So do I; but there is a time for everything under the sun.  It is a crying necessity that you go into this fight perfectly fit and with all your wits about you.  If you don’t, somebody—­several somebodies—­will land in the penitentiary.  Will you mind me?”

“Yes,” he promised; and this time he got away.

XXVI

ON THE HIGH PLAINS

Much to Elinor’s relief, and quite as much, perhaps, to Penelope’s, Mrs. Brentwood tired of Breezeland Inn in less than a fortnight and began to talk of returning to the apartment house in the capital.

Pressed to give a reason for her dissatisfaction, the younger sister might have been at a loss to account for it in words; but Elinor’s desire to cut the outing short was based upon pride and militant shame.  After many trap-settings she had succeeded in making her mother confess that the stay at Breezeland was at Ormsby’s expense; and not all of Mrs. Brentwood’s petulant justifyings could remove the sting of the nettle of obligation.

“There is no reason in the world why you should make so much of it:  I am your mother, and I ought to know,” was Mrs. Brentwood’s dictum.  “You wouldn’t have any scruples if we were his guests on the Amphitrite or in his country house on Long Island.”

“That would be different,” Elinor contended.  “We are not his guests here; we are his pensioners.”

“Nonsense!” frowned the mother.  “Isn’t it beginning to occur to you that beggars shouldn’t be choosers?  And, besides, so far as you are concerned, you are only anticipating a little.”

It was an exceedingly injudicious, not to say brutal way of putting it; and the blue-gray eyes flashed fire.

“Can’t you see that you are daily making a marriage between us more and more impossible?” was the bitter rejoinder.  Elinor’s metier was cool composure under fire, but she was not always able to compass it.

Mrs. Brentwood fanned herself vigorously.  She had been aching to have it out with this self-willed young woman who was playing fast and loose with attainable millions, and the hour had struck.

“What made you break it off with Brookes Ormsby?” she snapped; adding:  “I don’t wonder you were ashamed to tell me about it.”

“I did not break it off; and I was not ashamed.”  Elinor had regained her self-control, and the angry light in the far-seeing eyes was giving place to the cool gray blankness which she cultivated.

“That is what Brookes told me, but I didn’t believe him,” said the mother.  “It’s all wrong, anyway, and I more than half believe David Kent is at the bottom of it.”

Elinor left her chair and went to the window, which looked down on the sanatorium, the ornate parterre, and the crescent driveway.  These family bickerings were very trying to her, and the longing to escape them was sometimes strong enough to override cool reason and her innate sense of the fitness of things.