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A maid answered his ring. Lane asked for both Mrs. Wrapp and Helen. They were at home, the maid informed him, and ushered Lane into a gray and silver reception room. Lane had no card, but gave his name. As he gazed around the room he tried to fit the delicate decorative scheme to Mrs. Wrapp. He smiled at the idea.
But he remembered that she had always liked him in spite of the fact that she did not favor his attention to Helen. Like many mothers of girls, she wanted a rich marriage for her daughter. Manifestly now she had money. But had happiness come with prosperity? Then Mrs. Wrapp came down. Rising, he turned to see a large woman, elaborately gowned.
'What do you mean? asked Fanchon, growing red and flustered. "Then Daren said: 'I'll tell your mother. If she lets you dance with that understanding all right. He bent over Mrs. Smith and said something. Mrs. Wrapp heard it. And so did Mrs. Mackay, who looked pretty sick. Mrs. Smith nearly fainted!... but she recovered enough to order Daren to leave."
"It was four years ago and more. I was sixteen. You tried to kiss me and were angry because I wouldn't let you." "Well, wasn't I rude!" he exclaimed, facetiously. Then he grew serious. "Mel, do you remember it was Helen's lying that came between you and me as boy and girl friends?" "I never knew. Helen Wrapp! What was it?" "It's not worth recalling and would hurt you now," he replied.
"Yes, now and then, as she rides by in an automobile. But she never sees me.... Daren, I don't know what your your that engagement means to you, but I must tell you Helen Wrapp doesn't conduct herself as if she were engaged. Still, I don't know what's in the heads of girls to-day. I can only compare the present with the past."
Maynard, who had her own reasons for being relieved at the disgrace of Daren Lane. "No, Jane, you're wrong," spoke up Mrs. Wrapp, who, whatever else she might be, was blunt and fair-minded. "Lane wasn't drunk. He never drank before the war. I knew him well. He and Helen had a puppy-love affair they were engaged before Lane went to war. Well, the day after his return he called on us.
Wrapp rose to go. Whereupon she and Mrs. Kingsley, with gracious words of invitation and farewell, took themselves off leaving Mrs. Maynard contending with an outraged spirit. Certain terse remarks of the crude and practical Mrs. Wrapp had forced to her mind a question that of late had assumed cardinal importance, and now had been brought to an issue by a proposal for Margaret's hand.
Wrapp was the leading spirit of this self-appointed tribunal a circumstance of expanding, resentment to Mrs. Maynard, who had once held the reins with aristocratic hands. Mrs. Kingsley, the third member of the great triangle, claimed an ancestor on the Mayflower, which was in her estimation a guerdon of blue blood. Her elaborate and exclusive entertainments could never be rivalled by those of Mrs.
Wrapp, as he moved in the direction she had indicated. "Come." The wide hall, the winding stairway with its soft carpet, the narrower hallway above these made a long journey for Lane. But at the end, when Mrs. Wrapp stopped with hand on the farthest door, Lane felt knit like cold steel. The discordant music and the soft shuffling of feet ceased. Laughter and murmur of voices began.
"I think I'd like to go up," replied Lane. "If I were you, I would," advised Mrs. Wrapp. "I'd like your opinion of, well, what you'll see. Since you left home, Daren, we've been turned topsy-turvy. I'm old-fashioned. I can't get used to these goings-on. These young people 'get my goat, as Helen expresses it." "I'm hopelessly behind the times, I've seen that already," rejoined Lane.
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