Part 18 (1/2)

”Do you really _know_ him at all?” asked her father pointedly.

”Of course I do--I know he's very handsome, and awfully good-natured, and he's given me the only good time I've had at the University. You just don't know how ghastly last year was to me! I'm awfully grateful to Jerry, and that's all there is to it!”

Before this second disclaimer, her parents were silent again, Sylvia looking down at her lap, picking at her fingers. Her expression was that of a naughty child--that is, with a considerable admixture of unhappiness in her wilfulness.

By this time Professor Marshall's expression was clearly one of downright anger, controlled by violent effort. Mrs. Marshall was the first one to speak. She went over to Sylvia and laid her hand on her shoulder. ”Well, Sylvia dear, I'm sorry about--” She stopped and began again. ”You know, dear, that we always believed in letting our children, as far as possible, make their own decisions, and we won't go back on that now. But I want you to understand that that puts a bigger responsibility on you than on most girls to make the _right_ decisions. We trust you--your good sense and right feeling--to keep you from being carried away by unworthy motives into a false position.

And, what's just as important, we trust to your being clear-headed enough to see what your motives really are.”

”I don't see,” began Sylvia, half crying, ”why something horrid should come up just because I want a good time--other girls don't have to be all the time so solemn, and thinking about things!”

”There'd be more happy women if they did,” remarked Mrs. Marshall, adding: ”I don't believe we'd better talk any more about this now. You know how we feel, and you must take that into consideration. You think it over.”

She spoke apparently with her usual calmness, but as she finished she put her arms about the girl's neck and kissed the flushed cheeks.

Caresses from Mrs. Marshall were unusual, and, even through her tense effort to resist, Sylvia was touched. ”You're just worrying about nothing at all, Mother,” she said, trying to speak lightly, but escaped from a possible rejoinder by hurriedly gathering up her text-books and following Judith and Lawrence upstairs.

Her father and mother confronted each other. ”_Well!_” said Professor Marshall hotly, ”of all the weak, inconclusive, modern parents--is _this_ what we've come to?”

Mrs. Marshall took up her sewing and said in the tone which always quelled her husband, ”Yes, this is what we've come to.”

His heat abated at once, though he went on combatively, ”Oh, I know what you mean, reasonable authority and not tyranny and all that--yes, I believe in it--of course--but this goes beyond--” he ended. ”Is there or is there not such a thing as parental authority?”

Mrs. Marshall answered with apparent irrelevance, ”You remember what Cavour said?”

”Good Heaven! No, I don't remember!” cried Professor Marshall, with an impatience which might have been Sylvia's.

”He said, 'Any idiot can rule by martial law.'”

”Yes, of course, that theory is all right, but--”

”If a theory is all right, it ought to be acted upon.”

Professor Marshall cried out in exasperation, ”But see here, Barbara--here is a concrete fact--our daughter--our precious Sylvia--is making a horrible mistake--and because of a theory we mustn't reach out a hand to pull her back.”

”We _can't_ pull her back by force,” said his wife. ”She's eighteen years old, and she has the habit of independent thought. We can't go back on that now.”

”We don't seem to be pulling her back by force or in any other way! We seem to be just weakly sitting back and letting her do exactly as she pleases.”

”If during all these years we've had her under our influence we haven't given her standards that--” began the mother.

”You heard how utterly she repudiated our influence and our standards and--”

”Oh, what she _says_--it's what she's made of that'll count--that's the _only_ thing that'll count when a crisis comes--”

Professor Marshall interrupted hastily: ”When a crisis! What do you call _this_ but a crisis--she's like a child about to put her hand into the fire.”

”I trust in the training she's had to give her firm enough nerves to pull it out again when she feels the heat,” said her mother steadily.

Professor Marshall sprang up, with clenched hands, tall, powerful, helpless. ”It's outrageous, Barbara, for all your talk! We're responsible! We ought to shut her up under lock and key--”