Anna herself seemed as happy, and for more explicable reasons. She had assisted, after luncheon, at another debate between Madame de Chantelle and her confidant, and had surmised, when she withdrew from it, that victory was permanently perched on Miss Painter’s banners.
“I don’t know how she does it, unless it’s by the dead weight of her convictions. She detests the French so that she’d back up Owen even if she knew nothing–or knew too much–of Miss Viner. She somehow regards the match as a protest against the corruption of European morals. I told Owen that was his great chance, and he’s made the most of it.”
“What a tactician you are! You make me feel that I hardly know the rudiments of diplomacy,” Darrow smiled at her, abandoning himself to a perilous sense of well-being.
She gave him back his smile. “I’m afraid I think nothing short of my own happiness is worth wasting any diplomacy on!”
“That’s why I mean to resign from the service of my country,” he rejoined with a laugh of deep content.
The feeling that both resistance and apprehension were vain was working like wine in his veins. He had done what he could to deflect the course of events: now he could only stand aside and take his chance of safety. Underneath this fatalistic feeling was the deep sense of relief that he had, after all, said and done nothing that could in the least degree affect the welfare of Sophy Viner. That fact took a millstone off his neck.
Meanwhile he gave himself up once more to the joy of Anna’s presence. They had not been alone together for two long days, and he had the lover’s sense that he had forgotten, or at least underestimated, the strength of the spell she cast. Once more her eyes and her smile seemed to bound his world. He felt that their light would always move with him as the sunset moves before a ship at sea.
The next day his sense of security was increased by a decisive incident. It became known to the expectant household that Madame de Chantelle had yielded to the tremendous impact of Miss Painter’s determination and that Sophy Viner had been “sent for” to the purple satin sitting- room.
At luncheon, Owen’s radiant countenance proclaimed the happy sequel, and Darrow, when the party had moved back to the oak-room for coffee, deemed it discreet to wander out alone to the terrace with his cigar. The conclusion of Owen’s romance brought his own plans once more to the front. Anna had promised that she would consider dates and settle details as soon as Madame de Chantelle and her grandson had been reconciled, and Darrow was eager to go into the question at once, since it was necessary that the preparations for his marriage should go forward as rapidly as possible. Anna, he knew, would not seek any farther pretext for delay; and he strolled up and down contentedly in the sunshine, certain that she would come out and reassure him as soon as the reunited family had claimed its due share of her attention.
But when she finally joined him her first word was for the younger lovers.
“I want to thank you for what you’ve done for Owen,” she began, with her happiest smile.
“Who–I?” he laughed. “Are you confusing me with Miss Painter?”
“Perhaps I ought to say for me,” she corrected herself. “You’ve been even more of a help to us than Adelaide.”
“My dear child! What on earth have I done?”
“You’ve managed to hide from Madame de Chantelle that you don’t really like poor Sophy.”
Darrow felt the pallour in his cheek. “Not like her? What put such an idea into your head?”
“Oh, it’s more than an idea–it’s a feeling. But what difference does it make, after all? You saw her in such a different setting that it’s natural you should be a little doubtful. But when you know her better I’m sure you’ll feel about her as I do.”
“It’s going to be hard for me not to feel about everything as you do.”
“Well, then–please begin with my daughter-in-law!”
He gave her back in the same tone of banter: “Agreed: if you ll agree to feel as I do about the pressing necessity of our getting married.”