The Old Gray Homestead

by Frances Parkinson Keyes

"Do you really think so? Do you believe that a young, innocent, sheltered girl, so pretty and so magnetic that she attracts immediate attention wherever she goes, who has starved for pretty things and a good time, and suddenly finds them within her reach, whose parents wilfully shut their eyes to the fact that she's growing up, and boast that 'they've kept everything from her'—and then let her go wherever she chooses, with that pitiful lack of armor, doesn't deserve another chance? And I think if you had stayed with her through last night—and seen the change that suffering—and shame—and hopelessness have wrought in that little gay, lovely, thoughtless creature, you'd feel that she had paid a pitifully large forfeit already—and realize that no matter how much we help her, she'll have to go on paying it as long as she lives."

Austin was silent for a moment; then he muttered:

"Well, why doesn't she marry Jack Weston? She admits that it was half her fault—and that he really does care for her."

"Marry him!" Sylvia cried,—"after that! He cares for her as much as it is in him to care for anybody—but you know perfectly well what he is! Do you want her to tie herself forever to an ignorant, intemperate, sensual man? Put herself where the nightmare of her folly would stare her perpetually in the face! Where he'd throw it in her teeth every time he was angry with her, that he married her out of charity—and probably tell the whole countryside the same thing the first time he went to Wallacetown on a Saturday evening and began to 'celebrate'? How much chance for hope and salvation would be left for her then? Have you forgotten something you said to me once—something which wiped away in one instant all the bitterness and agony of three years, and sent me—straight into your arms? 'The best part of a decent man's love is not passion, but reverence; his greatest desire, not possession, but protection; his ultimate aim, not gratification, but sacrifice.'"

"I didn't guess then what a beautiful and wonderful thing passion could be—I'd only seen the other side of it."

Sylvia winced, but she only said, very gently: "Then can you, with that knowledge, wish Edith to keep on seeing it all her life? It's—it's pretty dreadful, I think—remember I've seen it too."

"Good God, Sylvia, do stop talking as if the cases were synonymous! You were married! It's revolting to me to hear you keep saying that you 'understand.' There's no more likeness between you and Edith than there is between a lily growing in a queen's garden and a sweet-brier rose springing up on a dusty highroad."

"I know how you feel, dear; but remember, the sweet-brier rose isn't a weed! They're both flowers—and fragrant—and—and fragile, aren't they?" Then, very softly: "Besides, the lily growing in the queen's garden, even though the wicked king may own it for a time, is usually picked in the end—by the fairy prince—to adorn his palace; while the little sweet-brier rose any tramp may pluck and stick in his hat—and fling away when it is faded. And if it was really the property of an honest woodman and his wife, and the highroad ran very close to the border of a sheltered wood, where their cottage was—wouldn't they feel very badly when they found their rose was gone?"

"You plead very well," said Austin almost roughly, "and you're pleading for every one but me—for Edith and father and mother, who've all done wrong—and now you want to take the burden of their wrongdoing on your own innocent shoulders, and make me help you—no matter how I suffer! I've tried to do right—never so hard in all my life—and mostly—I 've succeeded. You've helped—I never could have done it without you—but a lot of it has been pulling myself up by my own bootstraps. Now I've reached the end of my rope—and I suppose, instead of thinking of that —the next thing you do will be to make excuses for Jack Weston."

"Yes," said Sylvia, very gently, "that's just what I'm going to do. I know how hard you've tried—I know how well you've succeeded. I know there aren't many men like you—as good as you—in the whole world. I'm not saying that because I'm in love with you—I'm not saying it to encourage you—I'm saying it because it's true. You've conquered—all along the line. It's so wonderful—and so glorious—that sometimes it almost takes my breath away. Darling—you know I've never reproached you—even in my own mind—for anything that may have happened before you knew me—and I know, that much as you wish now it never had happened—still you can comfort yourself with the old platitudes of 'the double standard.' 'All men do this some time—or nearly all men. I haven't been any worse than lots of others—and I've always respected good women'—oh, I've heard it all, hundreds of times! Some day I hope you'll feel differently about that, too—that you won't teach your son to argue that way—not only because it's wrong, but because it's dangerous—and very much out of date, besides. This isn't the time to go into all that—but I wonder if you would be willing to tell me everything that went through your mind for five minutes—when I came to you the night of the Graduation Ball, and you took me in your arms?"