“This other matter,” Mrs. Thornberry continued immediately, “is rather more serious. I came back from California the week after you sailed and I found a good deal of talk going on about Connie.” “Connie?” Mills repeated and his fingers tightened upon the ivory blade. “Connie’s not behaving herself as a married woman should. She’s been indulging in a scandalous flirtation--if that’s not too gentle a name for it--with George Whitford.” “Pshaw, Alice! Whitford’s always run with Shep’s crowd. He’s a sort of fireside pet with all the young married women. George is a fine, manly fellow. I don’t question that he’s been at Shep’s a good deal. Shep’s always liked him particularly. And Connie’s an attractive young woman. Why, George probably makes love to all the women, old and young, he’s thrown with for an hour! You’re borrowing trouble quite unnecessarily, Alice. It’s too bad you have to hear the gossip that’s always going around here; you take it much too seriously.” “It’s not I who take it seriously; it’s common talk! Shep, poor boy, is so innocent and unsuspecting! George hasn’t a thing to do but fool at his writing. He and Connie have been seen a trifle too often on long excursions to other towns when Shep, no doubt, thought she was golfing. What I’m telling you is gossip, of course; I couldn’t prove anything. But it’s possible sometimes that just a word will save trouble. You must acquit me of any wish to be meddlesome. I like Connie; I’ve always tried to like her for Shep’s sake.” She was probably not magnifying the extent to which talk about his son’s wife had gone. His old antagonism to Constance, the remembrance of his painful scenes with Shep in his efforts to prevent his marriage, were once more resurgent. Mrs. Thornberry related the episode of the dramatic club play which had, from her story, crystalized and stimulated the tales that had previously been afloat as to Connie’s interest in Whitford. Mills promptly seized upon this to dismiss the whole thing. Things had certainly come to a fine pass when participation in amateur theatricals could give rise to scandal; it merely showed the paucity of substantial material. He was at pains to conceal his chagrin. His pride took refuge behind its fortifications; he would not have his sister, of all persons, suspect that he could be affected by even the mildest insinuation against anyone invested with the sanctity of the Mills name. He told her of having met some old friends of hers in London as he accompanied her to the elevator. But when he regained his room he stood for some time by the window gazing across the town to the blue hills. The patriarchial sense was strong in him; he was the head and master of his house and he would tolerate no scandalous conduct on the part of his daughter-in-law. But he must move cautiously. The Whitfords were an old family and he had known George’s father very well. With disagreeable insistence the remembrance of his adventure in Laconia came back to him.