He marched down the stairs with as much self-possession as he could command.
Below him he saw Senator Corson, Mrs. Stanton, Silas Daunt, and the banker"s son. All were garbed for outdoors and the Senator was inquiring of Mrs. Stanton why Lana was not ready.
From the landing down to the hall Stewart found the ordeal an exacting one. Those below surveyed him with an open astonishment that was more disconcerting than hostility; he was in a mood to fight for himself and his own; but to deal in mere polite explanations, after Lana"s imperious command to keep silent on an important matter, was beyond any sagacity he possessed in that period of abashed wonder what to say or do.
It was his thought that Miss Corson, in her efforts to avoid an anticlimax of conventional procedure, was making a rather too severe test of him in forcing him to endure the unusual.
He did manage to say, "Good morning!" and smiled at them in a deprecatory way.
Coventry Daunt amiably responded as a spokesman for the group; but he had waited deferentially for his elders to make some response.
The Senator held a packet of telegrams in his hand. After Stewart had halted in the hall, putting on the best face he could and evincing a determination to stick the thing out, Senator Corson walked over and offered to give the mayor the telegrams. "They"re beginning to arrive from Washington, sir. Better read "em. They"ll afford you a great deal of joy, I"m sure."
Stewart shook his head, declining to receive the missives. He wanted to tell the Senator that more joy right at that moment would overtask the Morrison capacity.
"I wish I were younger and more of an opportunist," Corson avowed. "In these guessing times among the booms, here is gas enough to inflate a pretty good-sized presidential balloon." He waved the papers.
The Senator"s tone was still rather ironical, but Stewart was seeking for straws to buoy his new hopes; whether he was so recently away from Lana"s dark eyes that the encouragement in them lingered with him, he was not sure. He felt, however, that the Senator"s eyes did seem a little less hard than the polished ebony they had resembled.
An awkward silence ensued. The Senator stood in front of the caller and queried uncompromisingly with those eyes.
The caller, having been enjoined from babbling about the business that had been transacted behind the screen in the library, had no excuse to offer for hanging around there. "I--I suppose you"re going to the State House,"
he suggested, after he decided that the weather called for no comments.
"We are! We are waiting for my daughter," stated Corson, with a severity which indicated that he was determined, then and there, to rebuke the cause of her delay.
"I"m so sorry you have waited!" Lana called to them from the landing, and came hurrying down, fastening the clasp of her furs.
She went to Mrs. Stanton, her face expressing apologetic distress. "It"s so comforting, Doris, to know that you and I don"t need to bother with all these guest and hostess niceties. You"ll understand--because you"re a dear friend! Father will make the doors of the Capitol fly open for his party--and you"ll be looked after wonderfully." She bestowed her gracious glances on the others of the Daunt family, "I know you"ll all forgive me if I don"t come along."
She did not allow her amazed father to embarra.s.s the situation by the outburst that he threatened. She fled past him, patting his arm with a swift caress. "I"m going with Stewart--over to Jeanie Mac Dougal Morrison"s house. It"s really dreadfully important. You know why, father.
I"ll tell you all about it later. Come, Stewart! We must hurry!"
Young Mr. Daunt was near the door. He opened it for her. When Stewart pa.s.sed, following the girl closely, the volunteer door-tender qualified as a good sport. He whispered, "Good luck, old man!"
When Coventry closed the door he gave his sister a prolonged and pregnant stare of actual triumph.
It was only a look, but he put into it more significance than sufficed for Doris"s perspicacity.
He had confided to his sister, the evening before, his hopeful reliance on a girl"s heart.
But the Lana Corson who came down the stairs, who confronted them, who had fearlessly chosen her mate before their hostile eyes, was a woman.
And Coventry"s gaze told his sister boastingly that he had made good in one respect--he had called the turn in his estimate of a woman.
THE END