The girl greeted these early dismissals with considerable
relief. Dinner was to her a nightly ordeal whose
atmosphere swept appetite sky-high—took
the savour from meats, dried the throat.
Descending to the dining-room upon this evening, her
normal shrinking from the meal was considerably augmented.
On the previous night—the first upon which
Mr. Bob Chater’s legs had partnered hers beneath
the table—his eyes (like some bold gallant
popping out on modesty whenever it dared peep from
the doorway) had captured her glance each time she
ventured look up from her plate. The episode of
the nursery was equivalent to having slapped the gallant’s
face, and the re-encounter was proportionately uncomfortable.
Taking her place she was by sheer nervousness impelled
to meet his gaze—so heavily freighted it
was as to raise a sudden flush to her cheek.
Her eyes fled round to Mrs. Chater, received a look
that questioned the blush, drove it duskier; through
an uncomfortable half-hour she kept her face towards
her plate.
It was illuminative of the relations between husband
and wife that Mrs. Chater carved; her husband dealt
the sweets. The carving knife is the domestic
sceptre of authority: when it is wielded by the
woman, the man, you will find, is consort rather than
king.
Upon the previous evening Mr. Bob Chater had led the
conversation. To-night he was indisposed for
the position—would not take it despite
his mother’s desperate attempts to board the
train of his ideas and by it be carried to scenes
of her son’s adventures. A dozen times she
presented her ticket; as often Bob turned her back
at the barrier.
It was a rare event this refusal of his to carry passengers.
So loudly did he whistle as a rule as to attract all
in the vicinity, convinced that there was an important
train by which it would be agreeable to travel.
For Mr. Bob Chater was a loud young man, emanating
a swaggering air that the term “side”
well fitted. To have some conceit of oneself is
an excellent affair. The possession is a keel
that gives to the craft a dignified balance upon the
stream of life—prevents it from being sailed
too close to mud; helps maintain stability in sudden
gale. Other craft are keelless—they
are canoes; bobbing, unsteady, likely to capsize in
sudden emergency; prone to drift into muddy waters;
liable to be swept anywhither by any current.
Others, again—and Mr. Bob Chater was of
these—are over-freighted upon one quarter
or another: they sail with a list. Amongst
well-trimmed boats these learn in time not to adventure,
since here they are greeted with ridicule or with
contempt; yet among the keelless fleets they have a
position of some authority; holding it on the same
principle as that by which among beggars he who has
a coin—even though base—is accounted
king.
