"It isn't absurd and nonsensical!" I cried. And I could hardly say the words, I was choking up so. "Everybody said you were going to, and I wrote Mother so; and—"
"You wrote that to your mother?" He did jump from his chair this time.
"Yes; and she was glad."
"Oh, she was!" He sat down sort of limp-like and queer.
"Yes. She said she was glad you'd found an estimable woman to make a home for you."
"Oh, she did." He said this, too, in that queer, funny, quiet kind of way.
"Yes." I spoke, decided and firm. I'd begun to think, all of a sudden, that maybe he didn't appreciate Mother as much as she did him; and I determined right then and there to make him, if I could. When I remembered all the lovely things she'd said about him—
"Father," I began; and I spoke this time, even more decided and firm.
"I don't believe you appreciate Mother."
"Eh? What?"
He made me jump this time, he turned around with such a jerk, and spoke so sharply. But in spite of the jump I still held on to my subject, firm and decided.