CHAPTER VI.
A SCHEME OF LIFE.
MARIAN waited for her father's return, having been much too deeply excited for the speedy advent of quiet sleep. When at last he came she told him everything. As she described the first part of the interview his brow darkened, but his face softened as she drew toward the close. When she ceased he said:—
"Don't you see I was right in saying that your own tact would guide you better than my reason? If I, instead of your own nature, had directed you, we should have made an awful mess of it. Now let me think a moment. This young fellow has suggested an idea to me,—a general line of action which I think you can carry out. There is nothing like a good definite plan,—not cast-iron, you know, but flexible and modified by circumstances as you go along, yet so clear and defined as to give you something to aim at. Confound it, that's what's the matter with our military authorities. If McClellan is a ditch-digger let them put a general in command; or, if he is a general, give him what he wants and let him alone. There is no head, no plan. I confess, however, that just now I am chiefly interested in your campaigns, which, after all, stand the best chance of bringing about union, in spite of your negative mood manifested to-night. Nature will prove too strong for you, and some day—soon probably—you will conquer, only to surrender yourself. Be that as it may, the plan I suggest need not be interfered with. Be patient. I'm only following the tactics in vogue,—taking the longest way around to the point to be attacked. Lane said that if you carried out your present principle of action you would have a power possessed by few. I think he is right. I'm not flattering you. Little power of any kind can co-exist with vanity. The secret of your fascination is chiefly in your individuality. There are other girls more beautiful and accomplished who have not a tithe of it. Now and then a woman is peculiarly gifted with the power to influence men,—strong men, too. You had this potency in no slight degree when neither your heart nor your brain was very active. You will find that it will increase with time, and if you are wise it will be greater when you are sixty than at present. If you avoid the Scylla of vanity on the one hand, and the Charybdis of selfishness on the other, and if the sympathies of your heart keep pace with a cultivated mind, you will steadily grow in social influence. I believe it for this reason: A weak girl would have been sentimental with Lane, would have yielded temporarily, either to his entreaty or to his anger, only to disappoint him in the end, or else would have been conventional in her refusal and so sent him to the bad, probably. You recognized just what you could be to him, and had the skill—nature, rather, for all was unpremeditated—to obtain an influence by which you can incite him to a better manhood and a greater success, perhaps, than if he were your accepted lover. Forgive this long preamble: I am thinking aloud and feeling my way, as it were. What did you ask him to promise? Why, to make the most and best of himself. Why not let this sentence suggest the social scheme of your life? Drop fellows who have neither brains nor heart,—no good mettle in them,—and so far as you have influence strive to inspire the others to make the most and best of themselves. You would not find the kitchen-maid a rival on this plan of life; nor indeed, I regret to say, many of your natural associates. Outwardly your life will appear much the same, but your motive will change everything, and flow through all your action like a mountain spring, rendering it impossible for you to poison any life."
"O papa, the very possibility of what you suggest makes life appear beautiful. The idea of a convent!"
"Convents are the final triumph of idiocy. If bad women could be shut up and made to say prayers most of the time, no harm at least would be done,—the good, problematical; but to immure a woman of sweet, natural, God-bestowed impulses is the devil's worst practical joke in this world. Come, little girl, it's late. Think over the scheme; try it as you have a chance; use your power to incite men to make the most and best of themselves. This is better than levying your little tribute of flattery and attention, like other belles,—a phase of life as common as cobble-stones and as old as vanity. For instance, you have an artist among your friends. Possibly you can make him a better artist and a better fellow in every way. Drop all muffs and sticks; don't waste yourself on them. Have considerable charity for some of the wild fellows, none for their folly, and from the start tolerate no tendencies toward sentimentality. You will find that the men who admire girls bent on making eyes rather than making men will soon disappear. Sensible fellows won't misunderstand you, even though prompted to more than friendship; and you will have a circle of friends of which any woman might be proud. Of course you will find at times that unspoken negatives will not satisfy; but if a woman has tact, good sense, and sincerity, her position is impregnable. As long as she is not inclined to love a man herself, she can, by a mere glance, not only define her position, but defend it. By simple dignity and reserve she can say to all, 'Thus far and no farther.' If, without encouragement, any one seeks to break through this barrier he meets a quiet negative which he must respect, and in his heart does respect. Now, little girl, to sum up your visit, with its long talks and their dramatic and unexpected illustration, I see nothing to prevent you from going forward and making the best and most of your life according to nature and truth. You have a good start, and a rather better chance than falls to the lot of the majority."
"Truly," said Marian, thoughtfully, "we don't appear to grow old and change by time so much as by what happens,—by what we think and feel. Everything appears changed, including you and myself."
"It's more in appearance than in reality. You will find the impetus of your old life so strong that it will be hard even to change the direction of the current. You will be much the same outwardly, as I said before. The stream will flow through the same channel of characteristic traits and habits. The vital change must be in the stream itself,—the motive from which life springs."
How true her father's words seemed on the following evening after her return! Her mother, as she sat down, to their dainty little dinner, looked as if her serenity had been undisturbed by a single perplexing thought during the past few days. There was the same elegant, yet rather youthful costume for a lady of her years; the same smiling face, not yet so full in its outline as to have lost all its girlish beauty. It was marred by few evidences of care and trouble, nor was it spiritualized by thought or deep experience.
Marian observed her closely, not with any disposition towards cold or conscious criticism, but in order that she might better understand the conditions of her own life. She also had a wakening curiosity to know just what her mother was to her father and he to her. The hope was forming that she could make them more to each other. She had too much tact to believe that this could be done by general exhortations. If anything was to be accomplished it must be by methods so fine and unobtrusive as to be scarcely recognized.