Part 23 (1/2)
”He is not old. He is no older than papa, and you don't call him old,” Ina retorted, resentfully.
”I don't call him old for a father, but I would for--”
”Well, he isn't a--yet.”
”Ina, you ought to tell me.”
”Well, I'm going to marry Major Arms, so there!”
”Oh, Ina!”
The two girls stood staring at each other for a moment, then they ran to each other. ”Oh, Charlotte! oh, Charlotte!” sobbed Ina, convulsively.
”Oh, Ina! oh, honey!”
”I'm going to, Charlotte. Oh, I am going to!”
”Ina, do you, do you--”
”What?”
”Love that old Major Arms?” Charlotte spoke out, in a tone of almost horror.
”I don't know. Oh, I don't know,” sobbed Ina.
”Ina, you don't love--Mr. Eastman better?”
”No, I don't,” replied Ina, in a tone of utter conviction.
”Charlotte, do you know what would happen if I married Mr. Eastman?
Do you?”
”No, I don't.”
”All my life long I would be at war with the butcher and baker, just as--just as we always are.”
”Ina Carroll, you aren't getting married just for that? Oh, that is dreadful!”
”No, I am not,” said Ina. ”You call Major Arms old, and you don't see--you don't see how a girl can ever fall in love with him, but--I think he's splendid. Yes, I do. You can laugh, Charlotte, but I do.
And it is a good deal to marry a man you can honestly say you think is splendid! But you can do a thing, for a very good, even a n.o.ble reason, and all the time know there is another reason not quite so n.o.ble, that you can't help but take some comfort in. And that is the way I do with this. Charlotte, poor papa does just the best he can, and there never was a man like him; Major Arms isn't anything in comparison with papa. I never thought he was, but there is one thing I am very tired of in this world, and I can't help thinking with a good deal of pleasure that when I am married I will be free from it.”
”What is that, honey?” The two girls had sat down on Ina's window-seat, and were nestling close together, with their arms around each other's waist, and the two streams of dark hair intermingling.
”I am heartily tired,” said Ina, in a tone of impatient scorn, ”of this everlasting annoyance to which we are subjected from the people who want us to pay them money for the necessaries of life. We must have a certain amount of things in order to live at all, and if people must have the money for them, I want them to have it, and not have to endure such continual persecution.”
”Ina,” said Charlotte, in a piteous, low voice, ”do you think papa is very poor?”
”Yes, honey, I am afraid he is very poor.”
Charlotte began to weep softly against her sister's shoulder.