The Judge waved her raillery away with a smile. The physical resemblance between father and daughter was remarkable. “I asked you what was the matter with Lydia,” he repeated.
Mrs. Mortimer’s face clouded. “Oh, it’s a hateful, horrid sort of world we’re all so eager to push her into. It’s like a can full of angleworms, everlastingly squirming and wriggling to get to the top. I was just thinking that it would be better for her, maybe, if she could always stay a little girl and travel ’round to see things.”
“Why, Etta! I tell you I’m glad to have Lydia get through with her traveling ’round. Maybe I can see something of her if I hurry up and do it now before your mother gets things going. I won’t after that, of course. I never have.”
To this his daughter had one of her abrupt, disconcerting responses. “You’d better hurry and do it before you get so deep in some important trial that you wouldn’t know Lydia from a plaster image. There are more reasons than just Mother and card parties why you don’t see much of her, I guess.”
Judge Emery forbore to argue the point. “Where are they now?” he asked.
“Oh, upstairs, out of my way. Mother’s usual state of mind about Lydia is more so than ever, I warn you. She thought I wasn’t refined enough company.”
“Now, Etta, you know your mother never thought any such thing.”
“Well, I know she was inconsistent, whatever she thought. While we were here alone she was speculating about Paul Hollister like anything. And yet, because I just happened to mention to Lydia that he is getting on in the world, I got put down as if I’d tried to make her marry him for his prospects.”
There was an edge in her voice which her father deprecated, rubbing his shaven chin mildly. He deplored the appearance of a flaw in the smooth surface of harmony he loved to see in his family.
“Well, you know, Marietta, we aim to have everything about right for Lydia. She’s all we’ve got left now the rest of you are settled.”