§ 24
“He is without any pride of family.” That had been the verdict upon the Major pronounced by his mother, who had been a grand lady in her own day. She would turn to her eldest daughter and say, “Look after him, Nannie! Make him keep his shoes shined!” And so now, towards the end of their conference, Sylvia and her father found themselves looking at each other and saying, “What will Aunt Nannie say?” Sylvia was laughing, but all the same she had not the nerve to face her aunt, and ’phoned the Bishop to ask him to break the news.
Half an hour later the energetic lady’s automobile was heard at the door. And now behold, a grand council, with the Major and his wife, Mrs. Chilton, Mrs. Tuis, Mr. Mandeville Castleman, Sylvia and Celeste—the last having learned that something startling had happened, and being determined to find out about it.
“Now,” began Aunt Nannie, “what is this that Basil has been trying to tell me?”
There was no reply.
“Mandeville,” she demanded, “have you heard this news?”
“No,” said Uncle Mandeville.
“That Sylvia has engaged herself to Frank Shirley!”
“Good God!” said Uncle Mandeville.
“Sylvia!” exclaimed Celeste, in horror.
“Is it true?” demanded Aunt Nannie—in a tone which said that she declined to comment until official confirmation had been received.
“It is true,” said Sylvia.
“And what have you to say about it?” inquired Aunt Nannie. She looked first at the Major, then at his wife, and then at Mrs. Tuis; but no one had anything to say.
“I can’t quite believe that you’re in your right senses,” continued the speaker. “Or that I have heard you say the words. What can have got into you?”
“Nannie,” said the Major, clearing his throat, “Sylvia doesn’t want to marry him for a long time.”
“But she proposes to be engaged to him, I understand!”
“Yes,” admitted the other.
“And this engagement is to be announced?”
“Why—er—I suppose——”
“Certainly,” put in Sylvia.
“And when, may I ask?”
“At once.”
“And is there nobody here who has thought of the consequences? Possibly you have overlooked the fact that one of my daughters has planned to marry Ridgely Peyton next month. That is to be called off?”
“What do you mean, Aunt Nannie?”
“Can you be childish enough to imagine that the Peytons will consent to marry into a family with a convict’s son in it?”
“Nannie!” protested the Major.
“I know!” replied Mrs. Chilton. “Sylvia doesn’t like the words. But if she proposes to marry a convict’s son, she may as well get used to them now as later. It’s the thing that people will be saying about her for the balance of her days; the thing they’ll be saying about all of us everywhere. Look at Celeste there—just ready to come out! How much chance she’ll have—with such a start! Her sister engaged to Frank Shirley!”
Sylvia turned to Celeste, and the eyes of these two met. Celeste turned pale, and her look was eloquent of dismay.
“Nannie,” put in the Major, protestingly, “Frank Shirley is a fine, straight fellow——”
“I’ve nothing to say against Frank Shirley,” exclaimed the other. “I know nothing about him, and never expect to know anything about him. But I know the story of his family, and I know that he’s no right in ours. And what’s more, he knows it too—if he were a man with any conscience or self-respect, he’d not consent to ruin Sylvia’s life!”
“Aunt Nannie,” broke in the girl, “is one to think of nothing in marriage but worldly pride?”
“Worldly pride!” ejaculated the other. “You call it worldly pride—because you, who have been the favorite child of the Castlemans, who have been given every luxury, every privilege, are asked not to trample your sisters and cousins! To give way to a blind passion, and put a stain upon our name that will last for generations! Where do you suppose you’d have been to-day if your forefathers had acted in such fashion? Do you imagine that you’d have been the belle of Castleman Hall, the most sought-after girl in the state?”
That was the argument. For some minutes Mrs. Chilton went on to pour it forth. And angry as she was, Sylvia could not but feel the force of it, and realize the effect it was producing on the other members of the council. It was not the voice of a woman speaking; it was the voice of something greater than any of them, or than all of them together—a thing that had come from dim-distant ages, and would continue into an impenetrable future. It was the voice of the Family! No light thing it was, in truth, to be the favorite daughter of the Castlemans! Not a responsibility one could evade, an honor one could decline!
“You are where you are to-day,” proclaimed the speaker, “because other women thought of you when they chose their husbands. And I have never observed in you any unwillingness to accept the advantages they have handed on to you, any contempt for admiration and success. You are only a girl, of course; you can’t be expected to realize all the meaning of your marriage to your family; but your mother and father know, and they ought to have impressed it on you, instead of leaving you to run wild and be trapped by the first unprincipled man that came along!”
There was a pause. The Major and his wife sat in silence, with a guilty look upon their faces. “Worldly pride!” exclaimed Aunt Nannie, turning upon them. “Have you told her about your own marriage?”
“What do you mean?” asked the Major.
“You know very well,” was the reply, “that Margaret, when she married you, was head over heels in love with a nice, respectable, poor young preacher. And that she married you, not because she was in love with you, but because she knew that you were a noble-minded gentleman, the head of the oldest and best family in the county.” And then Aunt Nannie turned upon Sylvia. “Suppose,” she demanded, “that your mother had been sentimental and silly, and had run away with the preacher—have you any idea where you’d be now?”
Sylvia was hardly to be blamed for having no answer to this question, which might have been too much for the most learned scientist. There was silence in the council.
“Or take Mandeville,” pursued the Voice of the Family.
“Nannie!” protested Mandeville.
“You don’t want it talked about, I know,” said the other, “but this is a time for truth-telling. Your Uncle Mandeville was madly in love with a girl—a girl who had position, and money too; but he would not marry her because she had a sister who was ‘fast,’ and he would not bring such blood into the family.”
There was a pause. Uncle Mandeville’s head was bowed.
“And do you remember,” persisted Aunt Nannie, “that when the question was being discussed, your brother here asked that his growing daughters be spared having to hear about a scandal? Do you remember that?”
“Yes,” said Mandeville, “I remember that.”
“And how much nobler was such conduct than that of your Uncle Tom. Think——”
One could feel a sudden thrill go through the assembly. “Oh!” cried Miss Margaret, protestingly; and Mrs. Tuis exclaimed, “Nannie!”
“Think of what happened to Tom’s wife!” the other was proceeding; but here she was stopped by a firm word from the Major. “We will not discuss that, sister!”
There was a solemn pause, during which Sylvia and Celeste stared at each other. They knew that Uncle Tom Harley, their mother’s brother, was an army officer stationed in the far West; but they had never heard before that he had a wife, and were amazed and a little frightened by the revelation. It is in moments such as these, when the tempers of men and women strike sparks, that one gets glimpses of the skeletons that are hidden far back in the corners of family closets!