Part 32 (1/2)
”Um--um,” said the old lady, half to herself ”Yes--yes--perhaps
Um--um--”
”He will be much more content once he's settled in the new line
Politics as an end is silly--what becomes of the men who stick to it?
But politics as a ot out of it about all he can get--about all he needs”
”He hopes to be President”
”So do thousands of other et it hoould we live--hoould _I_ live--while aiting--and after it was over?
I detest politics--all those vulgar people” Margaret made a disdainful mouth ”It isn't for our sort of people--except, perhaps, the diploo by 'pull' or purchase I like the life I've led--the life you've led You've made me luxurious and lazy, Grandma Rather than President I'd prefer hiland, after a while, e could afford it We could have a great social career”
”You think you can e hi, her thoughts not showing at the surface
Her tone was neither discouraging nor encouraging, aret scented a doubt ”Don't you think so?” she said a little less confidently
”I don't know I don't know It will do no hararet's expression was suddenly like a real face from which a mask has dropped ”I must do it, Grandma If I don't I shall--I shall HATE him! I will not be his servant! When I think of the humiliations he has put upon me I--I almost hate him now!”
Madahed ”How seriously you take yourself, child,” said she ”All that is very young and very theatrical What do birth and breeding e to bear what is, after all, the lot of ence to use one's circumstances, whatever they may be, to accomplish one's ambitions? A lady cannot afford to despise her husband A lady is, first of all, serene You talk like a Craig rather than like a Severance If he can taint you this soon how long will it be before you are at his level? How can you hope to bring hi
”Never again let me hear you speak disrespectfully of your husband, my child,” the old lady went on impressively ”And if you are wise you will no ht of him than you would peraret dropped down at her grandmother's knee, buried her face in her lap ”I don't believe I can ever love hi as you believe that, you never can,” said Madareat a failure as mine was--as your mother's was If I had only knohat I knohat I a silence in the room ”Your married life, my dear,” she went on, ”will be what you choose to e in silly repinings or ruinous longings Make the best of what you have
Study your husband, not ungenerously and superciliously, but with eyes determined to see the virtues that can be developed, the faults that can be cured, and with eyes that will not linger on the faults that can't be cured Make hi to the superior sex”
”I don't feel that I do,” said Margaret ”I can't help feeling wo I'd been a man”
”That is because you do not think,” replied Madaently
”Children are the center of life--its purpose, its fulfill else Our only title to be here is as ancestors--to replace ourselves iser and better than we That ive birth Man instinctively knows this, and it is his fear of subjection to woainst every effort to develop her intelligence and her independence If you are a true wo, you will never forget your superiority--or the duties it imposes on you--what you owe to your husband and to your children You are a married woman now
Therefore you are free Show that you deserve freedoaret listened to the old woman with a new respect for her--and for herself ”I'll try, Grandmother,” she said soberly ”But--it won't be easy” A reflective silence, and she repeated, ”No, not easy”
”Easier than to resist and repine and rage and hunt another man who, on close acquaintance, would prove even less satisfactory,” replied her grandirl with the syoes out to inexperience frohtfully and have seen y loom and, on nearer view, fade into a th on iriefs and woes--you'll have none left for the real trials”
Margaret had listened attentively; she would remember what the old lady had said--indeed, it would have been hard to forget words so direct and so impressively uttered But at the rand her as deep commiseration as her broader experience permitted in the circuives a child who sees -anticipated picnic
CHAPTER XX