He was thoughtful all his way back to Deep Dale, and silent at dinner.
Undressing for sleep—if sleep came—he looked at his red rose with an odd rueful smile, and put it carefully in water.
At that moment Angela Hilary laughed softly as she let her dark hair fall free to the white hem of her nightgown. Then she threw a kiss to herself in the mirror.
The first thing Latham saw the next morning when he woke was a deep crimson rose. He lay very still for a long time watching it.
Morton Grant had delivered his sorry news on Monday. Dr. Latham had lunched with Mrs. Hilary on Wednesday.
Thursday was bleak and cold, and a slow chilly rain fell all day.
Helen and her father were alone in the library when the brothers joined them. She felt that her father meant to “have it out” then, and she was glad. For him and for her the tension was already too cruel. And it was Hugh’s due to know, and to know without longer delay. Once or twice she had felt that she herself must tell him. But the girlish lips he had kissed refused the words and the office; and she had an added instinct of reticence, part a reluctance to tale-bear, part a hurt, angry determination to leave her father to do his own “dirty work.”
“Stephen says you want to have a chat with me, Uncle Dick.”
So—her father had sent for Hugh; had sent Stephen.
“Righto,” the boy replied. In several senses he was not “sensitive,” and nothing of his uncle’s strain, or of Helen’s, had reached him.
Bransby turned to his daughter. “Helen, will you leave us for a little while?”
Helen met his gaze quietly, and sat down. She had been standing near the fire when her cousins came in.
Bransby sighed. But he saw it was useless to command her. She would not go.
Stephen had been looking at the books in the case. He turned sharply now and eyed them all intently. He was “sensitive,” and keenly so where Helen was concerned.
Hugh turned to Helen, smiling and happy: “I say, have you told him, then, Helen?”
Hugh turned to Bransby with a boyish laugh, a very slight flush of embarrassment on his young face, love, pride and victory in his eyes. “I suppose I am in for a wigging, eh?”
“Hugh,” Helen broke in, “Daddy has refused his consent.”
Hugh took a sharp step forward and threw up his head. “Refused his consent? Why?”