The peace of the quiet gallery enfolded him gratefully. He paid his respects to old favourites, saving a half-hour for the new arrivals. Dick Wingfield’s mother, convoying two girls, was among the other visitors. He had reached a point at which, half-unconsciously, he gave the women he knew an opportunity to cut him if they wished. The two girls became rather obviously intent upon the upper line of canvasses as he passed them. They were the daughters of his father’s neighbours; they had known him all their lives, and yet they deliberately turned their backs upon him. He had paused, a little resentful, a little ashamed, in a farther corner, when Mrs. Wingfield drew near and spoke to him. She had been one of his mother’s intimate friends and she touched him gently on the arm. “I am glad to see you, Wayne. We very rarely meet any more. I wish you would come to see me.” She was so gentle, the meaning of her kindness struck so deep that he flushed as he took her hand. “I have never lost faith in you, Wayne.” “Thank you; you’re the only one, then, Mrs. Wingfield. You and Dick are about all I have left.” “Who is this woman your father is marrying?” she demanded with sudden asperity. “A lady, of course. What would you expect of my father?” “I would expect him to be like all the other old fools,” she declared. “A woman like your mother, Wayne Craighill, can have no successor.” She still clasped his hand lightly, and he bent over her with deferential courtesy. “I hope he is marrying a good woman for your sake--and Fanny’s.” “Father wouldn’t marry any other kind; you may be sure of that,” laughed Wayne. “I don’t know anything of the kind. I have waited a good many years to see your father do something outrageous and now I’m going to be satisfied. Who is this person, anyhow?” “I positively decline to hear my future stepmother spoken of as a person!” “I dare say the word flatters her. I’m telling all your mother’s old friends that we’ve got to cut the woman on principle.” “The town will sit at her feet. You will yourself call upon her the day of her arrival.” “Not unless I’m insane, Wayne Craighill! The newspapers everywhere are making us out the wickedest city in the world, and between stock gambling and poker and divorces and worse we’re undoubtedly going to the bad. It’s time for us old settlers to assert ourselves. This woman your father is going to marry _may_ be perfectly respectable, but I decline to know her.” With this declaration Mrs. Wingfield rejoined her charges who hovered discreetly in a far corner in the belief that she was lecturing Wayne Craighill upon his sins. Wayne had been touched by her kindness in speaking to him when other women in her own circle were cutting him; and the encounter left him brooding upon his father’s marriage.