"
Mr. Stone looked full in her face, and before a gaze which seemed to go
through her and see things the other side, Cecilia dropped her eyes.
"It is strange," he said, "how you came to be my daughter!"
To Cecilia, too, this had often seemed a problem.
"There is a great deal in atavism," said Mr. Stone, "that we know
nothing of at present."
Cecilia cried with heat, "I do wish you would attend a minute, Father;
it's really an important matter," and she turned towards the window,
tears being very near her eyes.
The voice of Mr. Stone said humbly: "I will try, my dear."
But Cecilia thought: 'I must give him a good lesson. He really is too
self-absorbed'; and she did not move, conveying by the posture of her
shoulders how gravely she was vexed.
She could see nursemaids wheeling babies towards the Gardens, and
noted their faces gazing, not at the babies, but, uppishly, at other
nursemaids, or, with a sort of cautious longing, at men who passed. How
selfish they looked! She felt a little glow of satisfaction that she was
making this thin and bent old man behind her conscious of his egoism.
'He will know better another time,' she thought. Suddenly she heard a
whistling, squeaking sound--it was Mr. Stone whispering the third page
of his manuscript:
"'---animated by some admirable sentiments, but whose doctrines--riddled
by the fact that life is but the change of form to form--were too
constricted for the evils they designed to remedy; this little sect, who
had as yet to learn the meaning of universal love, were making the most
strenuous efforts, in advance of the community at large, to understand
themselves.
Pages:
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87
88
89
90
91
92
93
94
95
96
97
98