“Doubtless had he lived he would not have been inferior in distinction to my grandfather.”
“And you have started well in the same course? I need not ask you that. We all know it better, perhaps, than you know it yourself, and we are proud of it. My dear brother,” the girl’s voice which hitherto had been clear and even commanding in its tones, faltered at the mention of the dead, “my dear brother used to say that there was nothing that you might not hope for, nothing to which you might not rise.”
“You speak too well of me; but I hope that I am not altogether unworthy of my ancestors.”
The girl paused for a while. She seemed unable to utter what she had next to say. The flush mounted again to her cheek, and she stood silent and with downcast eyes.
Meanwhile the young man stood in utter perplexity. He had heard nothing from the girl’s lips but what might have made any man proud to hear. She knew, as she had said, the history of his race, and she believed him to be not unworthy of it. Yet this was not the way in which he had hoped to hear her speak. He was conscious that there was something behind that did not promise well for his hopes.
At last she went on. Her voice was low but distinct, her eyes were still bent on the ground.
“And what your fathers have been in Athens, what you hope to be yourself, you would have your son to be after you?”
“Surely,” he answered without thinking of what he was admitting.
“Could it be so if I—” she altered the phrase—“if a woman not of Athenian blood were his mother?”
He was struck dumb. So this was the end she had before her when she enumerated the honors and distinctions of his race.