第60章

Could Larry have foreseen the very real misery--for any doubt of her own qualities, any fear of her ability to carry herself well in any situation, are among the most acute of a proud woman's miseries--which for some twenty-four hours was brought upon Maggie by the well-meant intrigue of which he was pulling the hidden strings, he might, because of his love for Maggie, have discarded his design even while he was creating it, and have sought a measure pregnant with less distress.

But perhaps it was just as well that Larry did not know. Perhaps, even, it was just as well that he did not know what his grandmother knew.

Maggie's pride would not let her evade the risk; and her instinct for self-preservation dictated that she should reduce the risk to its minimum. So she wrote her acceptance--Miss Grierson attended to the phrasing of her note--but expressed her regret that she would be able to come only for the tea-hour. Drinking tea must be much the same, reasoned Maggie, whether it be drunk in a smart hotel or in a smart country home.

Maggie's native shrewdness suggested her simplest summer gown as likely to have committed the fewest errors, and the invaluable stupidity of Miss Grierson aided her toward correctness if not originality. When Dick came he was delighted with her appearance. On the way out he was ebulliently excited in his talk. Maggie averaged a fair degree of sensibility in her responses, though only her ears heard him. She was far more excited than he, and every moment her excitement mounted, for every moment she was speeding nearer the greatest ordeal of her life.

When at length they curved through the lawns of satin smoothness and Dick slowed down the car before the long white house, splendid in its simplicity, Maggie's excitement had added unto it a palpitant, chilling awe. And unto this was added consternation when, as they mounted the steps, Miss Sherwood smilingly crossed the piazza and welcomed her without waiting for an introduction. Maggie mumbled some reply; she later could not remember what it was. Indeed she never had met such a woman: so finished, so gracious, so unaffected, with a sparkle of humor in her brown eyes; and the rich plainness of her white linen frock made Maggie conscious that her own supposed simplicity was cheap and ostentatious. If Miss Sherwood had received her with hostility, doubt, or even chilled civility, the situation would have been easier; the aroused Maggie would then have made use of her own great endowment of hauteur and self-esteem. But to be received with this frank cordiality, on a basis of a equality with this finished woman--that left Maggie for the moment without arms. She had, in her high moments, believed herself an adventuress whose poise and plans nothing could unbalance. Now she found herself suddenly just a young girl of eighteen who didn't know what to do.

Had Maggie but known it that sudden unconscious confusion, which seemed to betray her, was really more effective for her purpose than would have been the best of conscious acting. It established her at once as an unstagey ingenue--simple, unspoiled, unacquainted with the formulas and formalities of the world.

Miss Sherwood, in her easy possession of the situation, banished Dick with "Run away for a while, Dick, and give us two women a chance to get acquainted." She had caught Maggie's embarrassment, and led her to a corner of the veranda which looked down upon the gardens and the glistering Sound. She spoke of the impersonal beauties spread before their vision, until she judged that Maggie's first flutter had abated; then she led the way to wicker chairs beside a table where obviously tea was to be spread.