“Better for the child to be out of it,”
she said to herself, and that singular anger with
Arthur for the sake of the boy, which was like anger
with him for his own sake, came over her. She
identified the two. She saw in Eddy the epitome
of his father, the inheritor of his virtues and faults,
and his retribution, his heir-at-large by the inscrutable
and merciless law of heredity. “Yes, it
is better for Eddy to be out of it,” she repeated
to herself, with the same reasoning that she might
have used had she been proposing to separate her brother’s
better self from his worse. But she resolved more
firmly that she would not go herself. She would
urge the others’ going, but she would remain.
Chapter XXXI
But in spite of Anna Carroll’s resolve, she
went to Kentucky with the others in two weeks’
time. She had had quite a severe attack of illness
after that night, and it had left her so weakened in
body that she had not strength to stand against her
brother’s urging. Then, too, Mrs. Carroll
had displayed an unexpected reluctance to leave.
She had evinced a totally new phase of her character,
as people who are unconquerable children always will
when least expected to do so. Instead of clinging
to her husband and declaring that she could not leave,
with an underlying submission at hand, she straightened
herself and said positively that she would not go.
She was quite pale, her sweet face looked as firm
as her husband’s.
“I am not going to leave you, Arthur,”
she said. “If your sister stays with you,
your wife can. Your sister can go, and take Eddy,
but your wife stays. I don’t care what
happens. I don’t care if Marie and Martin
do go. Marie is not cooking so well lately, anyway,
and I never did like the way Martin went around corners.
We can get new servants I shall like much better.
I shall go into the City myself next week to the intelligence
office. I am not afraid to go. I don’t
like to cross Broadway, but I can take a cab from the
station. I will sit there in a row all day with
those other women, until I get a good maid, if it
is necessary. I don’t care in the least
if Marie and Martin do go. You can get another
man who will turn the corners more carefully.
And I don’t mind because somebody took that
rug—somebody—who was not paid.
I think it was a very rude thing to do. I think
when you take things that way it is no better than
burglary, but I should not make any fuss about it.
Let the woman have the rug. Although it does
seem as if anybody had the rug, it ought to be that
man we bought it of in Hillfield. You know he
did not seem to like it at all, because he was not
paid for it. But maybe he did not come by it
honestly himself. He was a singular-looking man—a
Syrian or Armenian or a Turk, and one never knows
about people like that. I don’t mind in
the least; it is all right. And I don’t
care about the teacups and things. One of the
