Of his daughters, Laura had been the one most interested in his rings, and so he thought of Laura now as he placed in the tray the new ring he had bought, the one he would have liked for her. But a vague uneasiness filled his mind, for he knew she had the same craving as he for what gleamed out of these somber trays. The old Galician jeweler had long been quite a friend of hers, she had often dropped in at his shop to ask him curious questions about his women patrons. And it was just this side of him that Roger did not care for. So many of those women were from a dubious glittering world, and the old Galician took a weird vicarious joy in many of the gay careers into which he sent his beloved rings, his brooches, earrings, necklaces, his clasps and diamond garters. And Laura loved to make him talk. … Yes, she was her father's child, a part of himself. He, too, had had his yearnings, his burning curiosities, his youthful ventures into the town. "You will live on in our children's lives." With her inheritance what would she do? Would she stop halfway as he had done, or would she throw all caution aside and let the flames within her rise?
He heard a step in the doorway, and Deborah stood there smiling.
"A new one?" she inquired. He nodded, and she bent over the tray. "Poor father," Deborah murmured. "I saw you eyeing Laura's engagement ring at dinner to-night. It wasn't like this one, was it?" He scowled:
"I don't like what I see ahead of her. Nor do you," he said. "Be honest." She looked at him perplexedly.
"We can't stop it, can we? And even if we could," she said, "I'm not quite sure I'd want to. It's her love affair, not yours or mine—grown out of a life she made for herself—curious, eager, thrilled by it all—and in the center of her soul the deep glad growing certainty, 'I'm going to be a beautiful woman—I myself, I, Laura Gale!' Oh, you don't know—nor do I. And so she felt her way along—eagerly, hungrily, making mistakes—and you and I left her to do it alone. I'm afraid we both rather neglected her, dad," Deborah ended sadly. "And all we can do now, I think, is to give her the kind of wedding she wants."
Roger started to speak but hesitated.
"What is it?" she inquired.
"Queer," he answered gruffly, "how a man can neglect his children—as I have done, as I do still—when the one thing he wants most in life is to see each one of 'em happy."
CHAPTER VI
Roger soon grew accustomed to seeing young Sloane about the house. They could talk together more easily, and he began to call him Harold. Harold asked him with Laura to lunch at the Ritz to meet the aunt from Bridgeport, a lady excessively stout and profound. But that ended the formalities. It had all been so much easier than Roger had expected. So, in its calm sober fashion, the old house took into its life this new member, these new plans, and the old seemed stronger for the new—for Laura and Edith and Deborah drew together closer than they had been in many years. But only because they felt themselves on the eve of a still deeper and more lasting separation, as the family of Roger Gale divided and went different ways. At times he noticed it sadly. Laura, who had scarcely ever been home for dinner, now spent many evenings here. She needed her home for her wedding, he thought. Each daughter needed it now and then. But as the years wore slowly on, the seasons when they needed it grew steadily wider and wider apart. …
Early in May, when Roger came home from his office one night he found Edith's children in the house. From the hallway he could hear their gay excited voices, and going into the dining room he found them at their supper. Deborah was with them, and at once her father noticed how much younger she appeared—as she always did with these children who all idolized her so. She rose and followed him into the hall, and her quiet voice had a note of compassion.
"Edith's baby is coming," she said.
"Good Lord. Is anything wrong?" he asked.
"No, no, it's all right—"
"But I thought the child wasn't due for three weeks."
"I know, and poor Edith is fearfully worried. It has upset all her plans. I'd go up and see her if I were you. Your supper is ready; and if you like you can have it with the children."
There followed a happy boisterous meal, with much expectant chatter about the long summer so soon to begin at the farm up in the mountains. George, whose hair was down over his eyes, rumpled it back absorbedly as he told of a letter he had received from his friend Dave Royce, Roger's farmer, with whom George corresponded. One of the cows was to have a calf, and George was anxious to get there in time.
"I've never seen a real new calf, new absolutely," he explained. "And I want a look at this one the very minute that he's born. Gee, I hope we can get there in time—"
"Gee! So do I!" cried Bobby aged nine. And then Tad, the chubby three-year-old who had been intently watching his brothers, slowly took the spoon from his mouth and in his grave sweet baby voice said very softly, "Gee." At her end of the table, Elizabeth, blonde and short and rather plump, frowned and colored slightly. For she was eleven and she knew there was something dark and shameful about the way calves appear in barns. And so, with a quick conscious cough, she sweetly interrupted:
"Oh, Aunt Deborah! Won't you please tell us about—about—"
"About—about," jeered the ironical George. "About what, you little ninny?" Poor Elizabeth blushed desperately. She was neither quick nor resourceful.
"Now, George," said his aunt warningly.
"Wasn't I talking?" the boy rejoined. "And didn't Betsy butt right in—without even a thing to butt in about? About—about," he jeered again.
"About Paris!" cried his sister, successful at last in her frantic search for a proper topic of conversation. "Aunt Deborah's trip to Paris!"
"How many times has she told it already?" her brother replied with withering scorn. "And anyhow, I was talking of cows!"
"Very well," said his aunt, "we'll talk about cows, some cows I saw on a lovely old farm in a little village over in France."
"There!" cried his young sister. "Did she ever tell of that part of her trip?" And she made a little face at her brother.
"I don't care," he answered doggedly. "She has told about Paris lots of times—and that was what you wanted. Yes, you did. You said, 'About Paris.' Didn't she, Bob?"
"You bet she did," young Bob agreed.
"Now, children, children, what does it matter?"
"All right, go ahead with your barn in France," said George with patient tolerance. "Did they have any Holsteins?"
Soon the questions were popping from every side, while little Tad beamed from one to the other. To Tad it was all so wonderful, to be having supper away from home, to be here, to go to bed upstairs, to take part perhaps in a pillow fight. … And glancing at the glowing face and the parted lips of his small grandson Roger felt a current of warm new life pour into his soul.
Early in the evening he went up to Edith's apartment. He found his daughter in her room, looking flushed and very tense. He took her arm and they walked for a time. A trained nurse was soaping the windows. Roger asked the reason for this and was told that in case the baby did not come till morning the doctor wanted to pull up the shades in order to work by daylight. "And neighbors in New York are such cats! You've no idea!" said Edith. She looked out at the numberless windows crowding close about her home, and she fairly bristled with scorn. "Oh, how I loathe apartments!"