Jane heard the door open and close and her father’s quick step in the hall. She heard the click of his sailor hat as he dropped it on the bench beneath the hat-rack. Then his footsteps receded toward his library and were lost. Silence and the smell of cooking currants dominated the house once more.
She ought to go in, thought Jane, and—and talk to him. She ought to break the ice for André. It would be terrible for André. She walked slowly toward the parlor door. At the entrance to the library she paused. Her father was seated at his desk, running through the afternoon mail.
“Come in, kid,” he said.
Jane entered slowly. Her father went on opening letters. Jane stood beside the globe and looked down at him.
“What’s the matter, kid?” asked her father. “You look as sober as a judge.”
“Nothing,” said Jane.
Her father threw some mail in the waste basket. Then he looked up again with a smile.
“Anyone dead?” he inquired cheerfully.
“No,” said Jane.
“What’s the trouble?” he asked. “Been worrying about Bryn Mawr?”
“No,” said Jane. Bryn Mawr, indeed!
“Well—don’t,” said her father. “I’ll see you get there.”
“Papa—” began Jane desperately, and stopped.
“Yes,” said her father.
“Papa,” said Jane again, “I—I want you to help me.”
“All right,” said her father. “I will.”
“I—I hope you will,” said Jane a little desperately, then went on in a rush. “I—I want you to understand. I want you to remember that I—I’m not a—a child, any more. I want you to be good to André. I want—”
“Good to André?” repeated her father. He looked very much astonished.
“Yes—good to André,” said Jane. And then the doorbell rang. She rushed incontinently from the room and halfway up the stair. Minnie was coming out of the pantry. Jane sat down, just above the first landing. Minnie opened the front door. Jane could see André quite distinctly, from the dark of the staircase. He couldn’t see her.
“Is Mr. Ward in?” he asked. His voice sounded very brave and steady to Jane.
“Yes,” said Minnie and led him to the library door.
“Mr. Ward?” Jane heard him say, on the threshold. And then her father’s voice. “Come in, André.” She heard her father’s footsteps. André vanished into the library. An unknown hand closed the door.
Jane sat quite still, crouched down beside the bannisters. She couldn’t hear a thing. Not even the sound of muffled voices. It was dark on the staircase. The afternoon sunshine came slanting in, below, through the ground-glass panels of the front door. Little motes were dancing in it, up and down the hall. Jane clasped her hands and really prayed for André. She was praying to her father, she thought, though, not to God. Praying to her father, through that closed library door, to understand, to realize, to be good to André. The minutes slowly passed. It was so quiet she could hear the clock tick in the dining room.
Presently her mother came out through the pantry door. She had on a long white apron, stained with currant juice, and her hair was ruffled. She looked very flushed and pretty after an afternoon in the hot kitchen. But not very neat. She noticed André’s hat on the hat-rack, immediately.
“Who is here, Minnie?” she called over her shoulder.
“Mr. André,” said Minnie from the pantry.
“Where is he?” asked her mother.
“He asked for Mr. Ward,” said Minnie.
“For Mr. Ward?” said Jane’s mother incredulously. Then after a pregnant pause, “Where is he, now?”
“They’re both in the library,” said Minnie.
Then Jane’s mother perceived Jane. She looked her up and down as she sat crouched on the staircase.
“What does André want of your father?” she said.
Jane didn’t reply.
“Jane!” said Jane’s mother.
Jane stared at her in silence.
“What does this mean?” said Jane’s mother.
“Oh, Mamma!” pleaded Jane, suddenly finding her voice. “Please—please don’t—spoil it. Let him talk to Papa! Oh, Mamma—”
Without another word, regardless alike of Jane’s imploring entreaties and her own currant-stained apron, Mrs. Ward opened the library door. She closed it after her. Jane sat quite still, for several minutes, in horror. Then she heard her mother’s voice raised in incredulous indignation behind the closed door.
“I never heard anything so ridiculous in all my life! John, you haven’t been listening to them? André—it—it’s perfectly absurd—”
Jane waited to hear no more. She flung herself hotly down the stairs and burst in at the library door.
Her father was sitting very quietly in a leather armchair and André was erect at his side. Her mother stood in the centre of the room, her flushed, indignant face turned toward the men before her. She looked quickly at Jane.
“Jane, leave the room,” she said.
“I won’t,” said Jane. And closed the door behind her. Her father held out his hand.
“Come here, kid,” he said. Jane rushed to his side. She looked quickly up at André. She hoped her heart was in her eyes. André smiled steadily down at her. He looked shaken, however.
“Jane—” began her mother again.
“Lizzie,” said her father, and there was a note in his voice Jane had never heard before. “Leave this to me.”
Her mother, with compressed lips, sank down in the other armchair. Her father pressed Jane’s hand very kindly.
“Kid,” he said gently. “You know this won’t do.”
“What won’t do?” cried Jane in desperation.
Her father still held her hand.
“You—you and André can’t—get married.”
“Why not?” flashed Jane.
“Because you’re children,” said her father. It was terribly true.
“I don’t care!” said Jane.
“Well, I do,” said her father. “And so does your mother. And so do André’s parents. He very honestly told me that. And so does André, really. André doesn’t want to persuade you to do anything that
