"No harm in having a try for it--as soon as you really see what it is," he answered, as he strolled off to the smoking-room.
Mrs. Bolton was very much upset by what had happened at the Courtlands'. An unwonted and irksome sense of responsibility oppressed her. She discussed the matter with Miss Henderson and made Caylesham come to see her--Miss Pattie Henderson, who knew all about how Sophy's letter had reached her mother's hands; and Caylesham, whom Mrs. Bolton had made a party to the joke. It did not seem so good a joke now. She and Pattie were both frightened when they saw to what their pleasantry had led. Little Sophy's suffering was not pleasant to think of, and there was an uncomfortable uncertainty about the manner of Harriet's death. A scheme may prove too successful sometimes. Caylesham had warned Mrs. Bolton that she was playing with dangerous tools. He was not now inclined to let her down too easily, nor to put the kindest interpretation on the searchings of her conscience.
"You always time your fits of morality so well," he observed cynically. "I don't suppose poor old Tom's amusing company just now, and he's certainly deuced hard up."
Mrs. Bolton looked a very plausible picture of injured innocence, but of course there was something in what Frank Caylesham said; there generally was, though it might not be what you would be best pleased to find. Tom was not lively nor inclined for gaiety, and he had just made a composition with his creditors. On the other hand, Miss Henderson was in funds (having completed her negotiations with the Parmenter family), and had suggested a winter on the Riviera, with herself for hostess. There are, fortunately, moments when the good and the pleasant coincide; the worst of it is that such happy harmonies are apt to come rather late in the day.
"It's all different now that woman's gone," observed Mrs. Bolton. "It's the children now, Frank."
"Supposing it is, why am I to be dragged into it?"
Various feelings combined to make Mrs. Bolton very earnest.
"No, he hates being here now. Yes, he does. He only comes because he's got nobody else to speak to. And he's in awful dumps all the time. It's not very cheerful for me."
"I daresay not, Flora. But why doesn't he go back then?"