Chapter 32 - Page 2

return the reassurance she had given him.

"Of course, of course," he echoed.

He made his mother repeat her statement; but the unforeseen always
flurried her, and she was confused and inaccurate. She didn't actually
know who had telephoned: the voice hadn't sounded like Mrs. Spragg's...
A woman's voice; yes--oh, not a lady's! And there was certainly
something about a steamer...but he knew how the telephone bewildered
her...and she was sure she was getting a little deaf. Hadn't he better
call up the Malibran? Of course it was all a mistake--but... well,
perhaps he HAD better go there himself...

As he reached the front door a letter clinked in the box, and he saw
his name on an ordinary looking business envelope. He turned the
door-handle, paused again, and stooped to take out the letter. It bore
the address of the firm of lawyers who had represented Undine in the
divorce proceedings and as he tore open the envelope Paul's name started
out at him.

Mrs. Marvell had followed him into the hall, and her cry broke the
silence. "Ralph--Ralph--is it anything she's done?"

"Nothing--it's nothing." He stared at her. "What's the day of the week?"

"Wednesday. Why, what--?" She suddenly seemed to understand. "She's not
going to take him away from us?"

Ralph dropped into a chair, crumpling the letter in his hand. He had
been in a dream, poor fool that he was--a dream about his child! He sat
gazing at the type-written phrases that spun themselves out before
him. "My client's circumstances now happily permitting... at last in
a position to offer her son a home...long separation...a mother's
feelings...every social and educational advantage"...and then, at the
end, the poisoned dart that struck him speechless: "The courts having
awarded her the sole custody..."

The sole custody! But that meant that Paul was hers, hers only, hers
for always: that his father had no more claim on him than any casual
stranger in the street! And he, Ralph Marvell, a sane man, young,
able-bodied, in full possession of his wits, had assisted at the
perpetration of this abominable wrong, had passively forfeited his right
to the flesh of his body, the blood of his being! But it couldn't be--of
course it couldn't be. The preposterousness of it proved that it wasn't
true. There was a mistake somewhere; a mistake his own lawyer would
instantly rectify. If a hammer hadn't been drumming in his head he
could have recalled the terms of the decree--but for the moment all the
details of the agonizing episode were lost in a blur of uncertainty.

To escape his mother's silent anguish of interrogation he stood up and
said: "I'll see