“Oh-ho, cher Papa , you haven’t begun to find how practical we can
“Well, Louie, it’s a tempting idea, and I’ll think it over. I’ll see whether I can arrange my work.”
St. Peter knew at that moment that he would never be one of this lighthearted expedition, and he hated himself for the ungracious drawing-back that he felt in the region of his diaphragm.
The family discussed their summer plans all evening. Louie wanted to write at once for rooms at the Meurice, but Mrs. St. Peter ruled it out as too expensive.
That night, after he was in bed, St. Peter tried in vain to justify himself in his inevitable refusal. He liked Paris, and he liked Louie. But one couldn’t do one’s own things in another person’s way; selfish or not, that was the truth. Besides, he would not be needed. He could trust Louie to take every care of Lillian, and nobody could please her more than her son-in-law.
Beaux-fils , apparently, were meant by Providence to take the husband’s place when husbands had ceased to be lovers. Marsellus never forgot one of the hundred foolish little attentions that Lillian loved. Best of all, he admired her extravagantly, her distinction was priceless to him. Many people admired her, but Louie more than most.
That worldliness, that willingness to get the most out of occasions and people, which had developed so strongly in Lillian in the last few years, seemed to Louie as natural and proper as it seemed unnatural to Godfrey.
It was an element that had always been in Lillian, and as long as it resulted in mere fastidiousness, was not a means to an end, St. Peter had liked it, too.