Chapter 22 - Page 2

half-past three to
take my drops: it's really no use trying to follow
Bencomb's new treatment if I don't do it systematically;
and if I join you later, of course I shall miss my
drive." At the thought he laid down his knife and fork
again, and a flush of anxiety rose to his finely-wrinkled
cheek.

"There's no reason why you should go at all, my
dear," his wife answered with a cheerfulness that had
become automatic. "I have some cards to leave at the
other end of Bellevue Avenue, and I'll drop in at about
half-past three and stay long enough to make poor
Amy feel that she hasn't been slighted." She glanced
hesitatingly at her daughter. "And if Newland's afternoon
is provided for perhaps May can drive you out
with the ponies, and try their new russet harness."

It was a principle in the Welland family that people's
days and hours should be what Mrs. Welland called
"provided for." The melancholy possibility of having
to "kill time" (especially for those who did not care for
whist or solitaire) was a vision that haunted her as the
spectre of the unemployed haunts the philanthropist.
Another of her principles was that parents should never
(at least visibly) interfere with the plans of their
married children; and the difficulty of adjusting this respect
for May's independence with the exigency of Mr. Welland's
claims could be overcome only by the exercise of
an ingenuity which left not a second of Mrs. Welland's
own time unprovided for.

"Of course I'll drive with Papa--I'm sure Newland
will find something to do," May said, in a tone that
gently reminded her husband of his lack of response. It
was a cause of constant distress to Mrs. Welland that
her son-in-law showed so little foresight in planning his
days. Often already, during the fortnight that he had
passed under her roof, when she enquired how he
meant to spend his afternoon, he had answered
paradoxically: "Oh, I think for a change I'll just save it
instead of spending it--" and once, when she and May
had had to go on a long-postponed round of afternoon
calls, he had confessed to having lain all the afternoon
under a rock on the beach below the house.

"Newland never seems to look ahead," Mrs. Welland
once ventured to complain to her daughter; and
May answered serenely: "No; but you see it doesn't
matter, because when there's nothing particular to do
he reads a book."

"Ah, yes--like his father!" Mrs. Welland agreed, as
if allowing for an inherited oddity; and after that the
question of Newland's unemployment was tacitly
dropped.

Nevertheless, as the day for the Sillerton reception
approached, May began to show a natural solicitude
for his welfare, and to