's that has always
made me--SHE, you know, was drawn into a set--didn't discriminate
Private theatricals."

Ann Veronica remained anxious to hear more of her sister's story from
her father's point of view, but he did not go on. Even so much allusion
as this to that family shadow, she felt, was an immense recognition of
her ripening years. She glanced at him. He stood a little anxious and
fussy, bothered by the responsibility of her, entirely careless of what
her life was or was likely to be, ignoring her thoughts and feelings,
ignorant of every fact of importance in her life, explaining everything
he could not understand in her as nonsense and perversity, concerned
only with a terror of bothers and undesirable situations. "We don't want
things to happen!" Never had he shown his daughter so clearly that the
womenkind he was persuaded he had to protect and control could please
him in one way, and in one way only, and that was by doing nothing
except the punctual domestic duties and being nothing except restful
appearances. He had quite enough to see to and worry about in the City
without their doing things. He had no use for Ann Veronica; he had
never had a use for her since she had been too old to sit upon his knee.
Nothing but the constraint of social usage now linked him to her. And
the less "anything" happened the better. The less she lived, in fact,
the better. These realizations rushed into Ann Veronica's mind and
hardened her heart against him. She spoke slowly. "I may not see the
Widgetts for some little time, father," she said. "I don't think I
shall."

"Some little tiff?"

"No; but I don't think I shall see them."

Suppose she were to add, "I am going away!"

"I'm glad to hear you say it," said Mr. Stanley, and was so evidently
pleased that Ann Veronica's heart smote her.

"I am very glad to hear you say it," he repeated, and refrained from
further inquiry. "I think we are growing sensible," he said. "I think
you are getting to understand me better."

He hesitated, and walked away from her toward the house. Her eyes
followed him. The curve of his shoulders, the very angle of his feet,
expressed relief at her apparent obedience. "Thank goodness!" said
that retreating aspect, "that's said and over. Vee's all right. There's
nothing happened at all!" She didn't mean, he concluded, to give him any
more trouble ever, and he was free to begin a fresh chromatic novel--he
had just finished the Blue Lagoon, which