The next thing the Stirlings heard was that Valancy had been seen with Barney Snaith in a movie theatre in Port Lawrence and after it at supper in a Chinese restaurant there. This was quite true—and no one was more surprised at it than Valancy herself. Barney had come along in Lady Jane one dim twilight¹ and told Valancy unceremoniously if she wanted a drive to hop² in.

 

“I’m going to the Port. Will you go there with me?”

 

His eyes were teasing and there was a bit of defiance³ in his voice. Valancy, who did not conceal⁴ from herself that she would have gone anywhere with him to any place, “hopped in” without more ado. They tore into and through Deerwood. Mrs. Frederick and Cousin Stickles, taking a little air on the verandah, saw them whirl by in a cloud of dust and sought comfort in each other’s eyes. Valancy, who in some dim pre-existence had been afraid of a car, was hatless and her hair was blowing wildly round her face. She would certainly come down with bronchitis—and die at Roaring Abel’s. She wore a low-necked dress and her arms were bare. That Snaith creature was in his shirt-sleeves, smoking a pipe. They were going at the rate of forty miles an hour—sixty, Cousin Stickles averred⁵. Lady Jane could hit the pike when she wanted to. Valancy waved her hand gaily⁶ to her relatives. As for Mrs. Frederick, she was wishing she knew how to go into hysterics.

 

“Was it for this,” she demanded in hollow tones, “that I suffered the pangs⁷ of motherhood?”

 

“I will not believe,” said Cousin Stickles solemnly, “that our prayers will not yet be answered.”

 

“Who—who will protect that unfortunate girl when I am gone?” moaned Mrs. Frederick.

 

As for Valancy, she was wondering if it could really be only a few weeks since she had sat there with them on that verandah. Hating the rubber-plant.

分享到：