Page:A Son at the Front (1923) Wharton.djvu/28

years; not since the period of the interminable discussions about the choice of a school for George; and in spite of the far graver preoccupations that now weighed on him, and of the huge menace with which the whole world was echoing, he paused for an instant to consider the contrast between his clumsy person and that expensive and irreproachable room.

"You've taken away Beausite's portrait of you," he said abruptly, looking up at the chimney-panel, which was filled with the blue and umber bloom of a Fragonard landscape.

A full-length of Mrs. Anderson Brant by Beausite had been one of Mr. Brant's wedding-presents to his bride; a Beausite portrait, at that time, was as much a part of such marriages as pearls and sables.

"Yes. Anderson thought . . . the dress had grown so dreadfully old-fashioned," she explained indifferently; and went on again: "You think it's not war: don't you?"

What was the use of telling her what he thought? For years and years he had not done that—about anything. But suddenly, now, a stringent necessity had drawn them together, confronting them like any two plain people caught in a common danger—like husband and wife, for example!

"It is war, this time, I believe," he said.

She set down her cup with a hand that had begun to tremble.