Part 22 (1/2)
”But it is--partly,” Brenda put in.
”My dear girl, do let's have the thing clear,” her brother returned, but she diverted his apparent intention of making a plain statement by an impatient,--
”Oh! it's all _clear_ enough.”
”But it isn't, by any means,” Jervaise said.
”To us it is,” Banks added, meaning, I presume, that he and Brenda had no doubts as to their intentions.
”You're going to persist in the claim you made this morning?” Jervaise asked.
Banks smiled and shrugged his shoulders.
”Don't be silly, Frank,” Brenda interpreted. ”You must know that we can't do anything else.”
”It's foolish to say you _can't_,” he returned irritably, ”when so obviously you _can_.”
”Well, anyway, we're going to,” Banks affirmed with a slight inconsequence.
”And do you purpose to stay on here?” Jervaise said sharply, as if he were posing an insuperable objection.
”Not likely,” Banks replied. ”We're going to Canada, the whole lot of us.”
”Your father and mother, too?”
”Yes, if I can persuade 'em; and I can,” Banks said.
”You haven't tried yet?”
”No, I haven't.”
”Don't they know anything about this? Anything, I mean, before last night's affair?”
”Practically nothing at all,” Banks said. ”Of course, nothing whatever about last night.”
”And you honestly think...” began Jervaise.
”That'll be all right, won't it, Anne?” Banks replied.
But Anne, still leaning back in the corner of the settle, refused to answer.
Jervaise turned and looked down at her. ”If you all went...?” he said, giving his incomplete sentence the sound of a question.
”Oh! I should certainly go, too,” she replied.
Jervaise frowned moodily. I could see that he was caught in an awkward dilemma, but I was not absolutely sure as to the form it took. Had Anne made conditions? Her remark seemed, I thought, to hint a particular stipulation. Had she tried to coerce him with the threat of accompanying her brother to Canada unless the engagement to Brenda was openly sanctioned by the family?
”But you must see how impossible it is,” Jervaise said, still looking at Anne.
”_We_ don't think so,” Brenda put in.
”You don't understand,” her brother returned savagely.