The first indication those men had that Mr. Harbison
didn’t know the state of affairs was when he
turned and faced them.
“Mrs. Wilson is quite right,” he said
gravely. “We’re a selfish lot.
If Miss Caruthers is a responsibility, let us share
her.”
“To arms!” Jim said, with an affectation
of lightness, as they put their glasses down, and
threw open the door. Dal’s retort, “Whose?”
was lost in the confusion, and we went into the library.
On the way Dallas managed to speak to me.
“If Harbison doesn’t know, don’t
tell him,” he said in an undertone. “He’s
a queer duck, in some ways; he mightn’t think
it funny.”
“Funny,” I choked. “It’s
the least funny thing I ever experienced. Deceiving
that Harbison man isn’t so bad—he
thinks me crazy, anyhow. He’s been staring
his eyes out at me—”
“I don’t wonder. You’re really
lovely tonight, Kit, and you look like a vixen.”
“But to deceive that harmless old lady—well,
thank goodness, it’s nine, and she leaves in
an hour or so.”
But she didn’t and that’s the story.
It was infuriating to see how much enjoyment every
one but Jim and myself got out of the situation.
They howled with mirth over the feeblest jokes, and
when Max told a story without any point whatever,
they all had hysteria. Immediately after dinner
Aunt Selina had begun on the family connection again,
and after two bad breaks on my part, Jim offered to
show her the house. The Mercer girls trailed
along, unwilling to lose any of the possibilities.
They said afterward that it was terrible: she
went into all the closets, and ran her hand over the
tops of doors and kept getting grimmer and grimmer.
In the studio they came across a life study Jim was
doing and she shut her eyes and made the girls go
out while he covered it with a drapery. Lollie!
Who did the Bacchante dance at three benefits last
winter and was learning a new one called “Eve”!
When they heard Aunt Selina on the second floor, Anne,
Dal and Max sneaked up to the studio for cigarettes,
which left Mr. Harbison to me. I was in the den,
sitting in a low chair by the wood fire when he came
in. He hesitated in the doorway.
“Would you prefer being alone, or may I come
in?” he asked. “Don’t mind
being frank. I know you are tired.”
“I have a headache, and I am sulking,”
I said unpleasantly, “but at least I am not
actively venomous. Come in.”
So he came in and sat down across the hearth from
me, and neither of us said anything. The firelight
flickered over the room, bringing out the faded hues
of the old Japanese prints on the walls, gleaming
in the mother-of-pearl eyes of the dragon on the screen,
setting a grotesque god on a cabinet to nodding.
And it threw into relief the strong profile of the
man across from me, as he stared at the fire.
