"Well," responded Sir William, a little lamely, "we were married last night, mother--that's all. I don't know that there is much more I can say." "I differ from you on that point," Lady Frances' voice was formal; "I think that there is a very great deal more to be said. I take it for granted, however, that in a man of your years, this step was not necessary, or considered so, because of previous unwise conduct. Where did this affair take place?" "In the Cumberland Cafe," Sir William said, redly as a lad. "The Cumberland Cafe!" The old lady repeated the words slowly and with stress. "Will, I think you should be in a sanitarium--I do, really. Now, go up and bring that young woman downstairs at once. Meet me in the library with her. To say that I am astounded, and disappointed in you, would be to put it in the mildest possible way--the mildest possible way!" When Sir William, his arm through Daisy's, entered the long drawing-room, Lady Frances had taken a seat near the window. The baronet led the girl over. "This," he said, "is Daisy, mother. Dear--my mother." "How do you do," said Lady Frances Ware, evenly. "Sit down." The words were plain, but without any inflection to make Daisy feel ill at ease. Lady Frances Ware, no matter what the provocation, never descended to the plebeian level of scolding or bullying. As the girl took the high-backed chair by the window, a puff of the morning breeze bulged the great lace curtain, laying a fold of it across her knee. Bending forward to release the curtain, Daisy, in the necessary glance toward her coarse black skirt, became for the first time acutely conscious of her clothes. She had always moved in circles where people thought of clothes as entirely indexing the person. If she had had on a fine dress at that moment, Daisy could have faced a queen unabashed. But Lady Frances never even glanced toward her new-made daughter-in-law's dress. She was concerned completely with the girl's face. Without any ostentatious flourish of lorgnette, but simply and quietly and thoroughly, she studied it. "You have a frank expression, at any rate," she said, half to herself; then, more directly, she added, "How old are you?" "Seventeen past," said Daisy, as though to a schoolmistress. "Ah!" said Lady Frances. "Very young indeed to be away from home. But the viewpoint as to that is, I have noticed, different in this country. Where are your parents?" "At--at home," said Daisy, a little confusedly. She wanted to avoid, for the present at least, explaining that she had run away from home. "Quite so," commented the old lady, a little dryly; "and where is your home?" "Out in the country--on a farm." Lady Frances seemed relieved. "That is very satisfactory," she said, "highly so. There are--possibilities--in young people who have been brought up out of contact with the city. And you are only--how old?" "Seventeen, ma'am," Daisy repeated.