I stared at her. It seemed to me she must be out of her mind. Oh, I was indeed innocent, gentle reader.
“I’ve always treated her as a duchess, and have made the servants do it, and have trained her to treat them as if she were a duchess.” A proud smile came into her face, transforming it suddenly back to its loveliness. “The first time I ever read about a duchess—read, knowing what I was reading about—I decided that I would have a daughter and that she should be a duchess.”
At any previous time such a sally would have made me laugh. But not then, for I saw that she meant it profoundly, and for the first time I was realizing what had been going on in my family, all unsuspected by me.
“But first,” proceeded Edna, “she shall have the highest social position in New York. And you must help if I am to succeed.” The fury burst into her face again. “Those little wretches, snubbing her!—dropping her! I’ll make them pay for it.”
“Do you mean to tell me that Margot realizes all this?” said I.
“Poor child, she’s wretched about it. Only yesterday she said to me: ‘Mamma, is it true that you and papa are very common, and that we haven’t anything but a lot of stolen money? One of the girls got mad at me because I was so good-looking and so proud, and taunted me with it.’”
“Incredible!” said I, dazed.
“She’s horribly unhappy,” Edna went on. “And it cuts her to the heart to be losing all her dearest friends. I did my duty and taught her which girls to cultivate, and she was intimate only with the right sort of New York girls.”
“I expect she has been indiscreet,” said I. “They’ve found out why she made friends with them and——”
“You will drive me crazy!” cried Edna. “Can’t you understand? All the mothers and the governesses—all the grown people in respectable families teach the children. Those mothers who don’t teach it directly see that it’s taught by the governesses, or else select the proper friends for their little girls and see that they drop any who aren’t proper.”