“I don’t want to pry, my dear. But
I was afraid there might be something between you
and Fred, and I wanted to caution you. You see,
Mary”—here Caleb’s voice became
more tender; he had been pushing his hat about on
the table and looking at it, but finally he turned
his eyes on his daughter—“a woman,
let her be as good as she may, has got to put up with
the life her husband makes for her. Your mother
has had to put up with a good deal because of me.”
Mary turned the back of her father’s hand to
her lips and smiled at him.
“Well, well, nobody’s perfect, but”—here
Mr. Garth shook his head to help out the inadequacy
of words—“what I am thinking of is—
what it must be for a wife when she’s never sure
of her husband, when he hasn’t got a principle
in him to make him more afraid of doing the wrong
thing by others than of getting his own toes pinched.
That’s the long and the short of it, Mary.
Young folks may get fond of each other before they
know what life is, and they may think it all holiday
if they can only get together; but it soon turns into
working day, my dear. However, you have more
sense than most, and you haven’t been kept in
cotton-wool: there may be no occasion for me
to say this, but a father trembles for his daughter,
and you are all by yourself here.”
“Don’t fear for me, father,” said
Mary, gravely meeting her father’s eyes; “Fred
has always been very good to me; he is kind-hearted
and affectionate, and not false, I think, with all
his self-indulgence. But I will never engage myself
to one who has no manly independence, and who goes
on loitering away his time on the chance that others
will provide for him. You and my mother have
taught me too much pride for that.”
“That’s right—that’s
right. Then I am easy,” said Mr. Garth,
taking up his hat. But it’s hard to run
away with your earnings, eh child.”
“Father!” said Mary, in her deepest tone
of remonstrance. “Take pocketfuls of love
besides to them all at home,” was her last word
before he closed the outer door on himself.
“I suppose your father wanted your earnings,”
said old Mr. Featherstone, with his usual power of
unpleasant surmise, when Mary returned to him.
“He makes but a tight fit, I reckon. You’re
of age now; you ought to be saving for yourself.”
“I consider my father and mother the best part
of myself, sir,” said Mary, coldly.
Mr. Featherstone grunted: he could not deny that
an ordinary sort of girl like her might be expected
to be useful, so he thought of another rejoinder,
disagreeable enough to be always apropos. “If
Fred Vincy comes to-morrow, now, don’t you keep
him chattering: let him come up to me.”
“He beats me and I rail at him:
O worthy satisfaction!
would it were otherwise—that I could
beat him while
he railed at me.—”
—Troilus
and Cressida.
