her mind.

On her way up-stairs to dress for dinner she tried to confide her
anxieties to her mother.

"Mama," she said, "if you had a son, how would you feel toward the girl
he wanted to marry?"

"Oh, I should think her a cat, of course," Adelaide answered; and
added an instant later, "and I should probably be able to make him
think so, too."

Mathilde sighed and went on up-stairs. Here she decided on an act of some
insubordination. She would wear her best dress that evening, the dress
which her mother considered too old for her. She did not want Pete's
mother to think he had chosen a perfect baby.

Mr. Lanley, too, was a trifle nervous during the afternoon. He tried to
say to himself that it was because the future of his darling little
Mathilde was about to be settled. He shook his head, indicating that to
settle the future of the young was a risky business; and then in a burst
of self-knowledge he suddenly admitted that what was really making him
nervous was the incident of the pier. If Mrs. Wayne referred to it, and
of course there was no possible reason why she should not refer to it,
Adelaide would never let him hear the last of it. It would be natural for
Adelaide to think it queer that he hadn't told her about it. And the
reason he hadn't told was perfectly clear: it was on that infernal pier
that he had formed such an adverse opinion of Mrs. Wayne. But of course
he did not wish to prejudice Adelaide; he wanted to leave her free to
form her own opinions, and he was glad, excessively glad, that she had
formed so favorable a one as to ask the woman to dinner. There was no
question about his being glad; he surprised his servant by whistling as
he put on his white waistcoat, and fastened the buckle rather more snugly
than usual. Self-knowledge for the moment was not on hand.

He arrived at exactly the hour at which he always arrived, five minutes
after eight, a moment not too early to embarrass the hostess and not too
late to endanger the dinner.

No one was in the drawing-room but Mathilde and Farron. Adelaide, for one
who had been almost perfectly brought up, did sometimes commit the fault
of allowing her guests to wait for her.

"'Lo, my dear," said Mr. Lanley, kissing Mathilde. "What's that you have
on? Never saw it before. Not so becoming as the dress you were wearing
the last time I was here."

Mathilde felt that it would be almost easier to die immediately, and was
revived only when she heard Farro