But Charles
Edward and Lorraine were distinctly radiant, and Peggy was demurely
jolly. She sounded like her father played on a mandolin.
After supper Talbert took me to the summer-house at the foot of the
garden to smoke. Our first cigars were about half burned out when he
began to unbosom himself.
"I've been a fool," he said, "an idiot, and, what is more, an unnatural
and neglectful father, cruel to my children when I meant to be kind, a
shirker of my duty, and a bringer of trouble on those that I love best."
"As for example?" I asked.
"Well, it is Peggy!" he broke out. "You know, I like her best of them
all, next to Ada; can't help it. She is nearer to me, somehow. The
finest, most unselfish little girl! But I've been just selfish enough
to let her get into trouble, and be talked about, and have her heart
broken, and now they've put her into a position where she's absolutely
helpless, a pawn in their fool game, and the Lord only knows what's to
come of it all unless he makes me man enough to do my duty."
From this, of course, I had to have the whole story, and I must say it
seemed to me most extraordinary--a flagrant case of idiotic
interference. Peggy had been sent away to one of those curious
institutions that they call a "coeducational college," chiefly because
Maria had said that she ought to understand the duties of modern
womanhood; she had gone, without the slightest craving for "the higher
education," but naturally with the idea of having a "good time"; and
apparently she had it, for she came home engaged to a handsome, amatory
boy, one of her fellow "students," named Goward.
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