'Is the second letter A?'
The table moves.
'FA. Fa----?'
She is suddenly enlightened.
'Is the word Father? Yes.'
They all turn and look for the first time at Mr. Don. He has heard, and
rises apologetically.
MR. DON, distressed, 'I had no intention--Should I go away, Grace?'
She answers sweetly without a trace of the annoyance she must surely
feel.
MRS. DON. 'Perhaps you had better, Robert.'
ROGERS. 'I suppose it is because he is an unbeliever? He is not openly
antagonistic, is he?'
MRS. DON, sadly enough, 'I am afraid he is.' They tend to discuss the
criminal as if he was not present.
MAJOR. 'But he must admit that we do get messages.'
MRS. DON, reluctantly, 'He says we think we do. He says they would not
want to communicate with us if they had such trivial things to say.'
ROGERS. 'But we are only on the threshold, Don. This is just a
beginning.'
LAURA. 'Didn't you hear, Mr. Don--"Love Bade Me Welcome"?'
MR. DON. 'Does that strike you as important, Laura?'
LAURA. 'He said it was.'
MRS. DON. 'It might be very important to him, though we don't understand
why.'
She speaks gently, but there is an obstinacy in him, despite his
meekness.
MR. DON. 'I didn't mean to be antagonistic, Grace. I thought. I wasn't
thinking of it at all.'
MRS. DON. 'Not thinking of Dick, Robert? And it was only five months
ago!'
MR. DON, who is somehow, without meaning it, always in the wrong,
'I'll go.'
ROGERS. 'A boy wouldn't turn his father out. Ask him.'
MR. DON, forlornly, 'As to that--as to that----'
MRS. DON. 'I will ask him if you wish me to, Robert.'
MR. DON. 'No, don't.'
ROGERS. 'It can't worry you as you are a disbeliever.'
MR. DON. 'No, but--I shouldn't like you to think that he sent me away.'
ROGERS. 'He won't. Will he, Mrs. Don?'
MR. DON, knowing what her silence implies, 'You see, Dick and I were not
very--no quarrel or anything of that sort--but I, I didn't much matter
to Dick. I'm too old, perhaps.'
MRS. DON, gently, 'I won't ask him, Robert, if you would prefer me
not to.'
MR. DON. 'I'll go.'
MRS. DON. 'I'm afraid it is too late now.' She turns away from earthly
things. 'Do you want me to break off?'
The table moves.
'Yes. Do you send me your love, Dick? Yes. And to Laura? Yes.' She
raises her eyes to Don, and hesitates. 'Shall I ask him----?'
MR. DON. 'No, no, don't.'
ROGERS. 'It would be all right, Don.'
MR. DON. 'I don't know.'
They leave the table.
LAURA, a little agitated, 'May I go to my room, Mrs. Don? I feel
I--should like to be alone.'
MRS. DON. 'Yes, yes, Laura dear. I shall come in and see you.'
Laura bids them good-night and goes. She likes Mr. Don, she strokes his
hand when he holds it out to her, but she can't help saying, 'Oh, Mr.
Don, how could you?'
ROGERS. 'I think we must all want to be alone after such an evening.
I shall say good-night, Mrs. Don.'
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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