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Updated: June 19, 2025
Fane-Smith leaned back in his chair with a sigh, his eyes fixed absently upon a portrait of Napoleon above his mantel piece, his mind more completely shaken out of its ordinary grooves than it had been for years. He was a narrow-minded man, but he was honest. He saw that he had judged Raeburn very unfairly.
Farrant, her father replied contemptuously: Every one knows, my dear, that Mr. Farrant holds unorthodox views. Why, a few years ago he was an atheist, and now he's a mere Photinian. As no one but Mr. Fane-Smith had the faintest idea what a "Photinian" meant, the accusation could neither be understood nor refuted. Mrs.
"I don't think you have met my father before," she said. Raeburn had come a few steps forward; Mr. Fane-Smith inclined his about a quarter of an inch; Raeburn bowed, then said to Erica: "Perhaps Mr. Fane-Smith would prefer waiting in my study." "Thanks, I will wait where I am," said Mr. Fane-Smith, pointedly, ignoring the master of the house and addressing Erica.
Fane-Smith had been revolving the unpleasant thought in her mind that "really there was no knowing, Erica might be 'anything' since her mother was a 'nobody." At last they drew up before a large house in the most fashionable of the Greyshot squares, the windows and balconies of which were gay with flowers. "We shall find Rose at home, I expect," said Mrs.
Mr. Fane-Smith was in that stage of anger when it is pleasant to repeat all one's hot words to a second audience and, moreover, he wanted to impress Rose with the enormity of her visit. He repeated all that he had said to Erica, interspersed with yet harder words about her perverse self-reliance and disregard for authority. Rose listened, but at the end she trembled no longer.
Rose yawned, talked fitfully about the gayeties of the coming week, worked half a leaf on an antimacassar, and sang three or four silly little coquettish songs which somehow jarred on every one. Mrs. Fane-Smith, feeling anxious and harassed, afraid alike of vexing her husband and offending her niece, talked kindly and laboriously.
She was not sorry that her visit was drawing to a close, although the last week had gone much more smoothly. Her vigorous nature began to long to return to the working day world, and though she could very honestly thank Mr. Fane-Smith for his kindness, she turned her back on his house with unmixed satisfaction.
Fane-Smith did not say a word, his eyes wandered from the calm face to the still hands which clasped some sprigs of his native heather, the heather which Donovan's children had sent only the day before, but just in time to win one of his last smiles. Donovan and Erica spoke together in low tones, but something in the sound of that "gravened" voice arrested Mr. Fane-Smith's attention.
Fane-Smith would not like you to come here." "Oh, nonsense," said Rose, laughing. "He couldn't mind in such a case as this. Why, I can't stay in the street all night. Besides, he doesn't know anything about your home, how should he?" This was true enough, but still Erica hesitated. "Who was that white-haired patriarchal-looking man whom I met in the hall?" asked Rose.
She hardly knew whether to regard this as a relief or as a punishment. With a sigh she opened a second letter; it was from Charles Osmond, in reply to a despairing note which she had sent off just before her Saturday interview with Mr. Fane-Smith. It was one of his short, characteristic letters. "Dear Erica, 'It all comes in the day's work, as the man said when the lion ate him!
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