CONRAD NORMAN
She must have known that Con was right behind us, although she had not turned her head, and he, in his dancing-pumps, had not made a footfall audible to me. He shot past me instantly and overtook her. I heard him say: "Is it true? Are you going to—"
Was it "marry him"?
It sounded like "marry him"! And his tone was agonized.
I turned back to the porch and sat down on the steps, under an electric light, and consulted a cigarette.
I did not share the prejudices of Centerbrook, but the more I thought over the situation the more impossible it appeared. Con was simply the ne'er-do-well son of a drunken Irish baker whose business was held together by his wife and his daughters. Con had once helped them by driving the wagon and delivering the bread, but of recent years he had not done even that. He had worked for a week in the coal-office. He had been a clerk for at least two weeks in the grocery. He had tended the soda-fountain in the druggist's for perhaps a month. And there had been a period when it was understood that he was employed in New York. But, though he had no conspicuous vices, he had a cheerful irresponsibility that unfitted him for commercial life. He treated the grocery, the coal-office, and the drug-store as if their businesses were suffering from a lack of gaiety that could be supplied by bright
[ 183 ]
