He wasn't fit to have a
wife like Fanny, children as good as Helena and Gregory: he, Lee
Randon, was a damned ingrate! That bloody doll--he had threatened to
put it in the fire before--could now go where it belonged. But the
hearth was empty, cold. Cytherea, with her disdainful gaze, evaded his
wavering reach.
III
Fanny, where the Groves were concerned, was utterly opposed to the plan
which, Lee gathered, Claire had half supported. "It's really too
foolish," his wife told him; "what can Mrs. Grove and you have to say
to each other? And you won't get anywhere with Mina Raff. Indeed, Lee,
I think it isn't quite dignified of you."
"That won't bother me," he replied indulgently. "I was wondering--you
haven't been away for so long--if you'd come with me. This other affair
wouldn't take half a day: you could buy clothes and there are the
theatres."
"I'd love to." She hesitated. "When did you mean to go?" But, when he
said the following noon, she discovered that that didn't allow her
enough time for preparations. "You don't realize how much there is to
do here, getting the servants and the children satisfactorily arranged.
You might telephone me after you're there; and, if you didn't come back
at once, perhaps I could manage it."
Lee telegraphed Mrs. William Loyd Grove of his intention; and, with a
table put up at his seat in the Pullman car for New York, he occupied
himself opportunely with the reports of his varied profitable concerns.
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