The iliad of her little woes, piteously assailing those walls of half-knowledge shutting her out from her mede of common-sense and common understanding! The odyssey of her little wanderings following half-truths, misled by platitudes, failing ever of the haven of truth where she would be! Alas for you, Mamma and Auntie, who with all your yearnings over her, have so pitifully equipped your one ewe lamb for life!
Culpepper the while Selina talked, thus guileless of her guilelessness, thus innocent of her innocence, had been gazing at her across the space of the hearth between them, his eyes upon her, but following thoughts of his own. He came to himself with a start.
Now that she, this pretty girl here before the fire with him in this intimate aloofness, was growing up, tall and fair, that crown of pale, shining hair distinguishing her, it came upon him at times such as now, with a clutch, a catching of his breath, to have her still so ingenuously sweet, still so honest, still so utterly and so endearingly confiding. It disarmed him. It broke down his control. It got into that blatant blood of his and for moments made him see red and feel afraid for himself. He wanted to seize her hands there in her lap, and kiss their helpless palms! No, he wanted to seize her and kiss her, kiss her until she awoke to the facts of life and—understood. And this achieved, lay down the mandate to her that he was here, and all the while had been here, for the man-made and Heaven-sanctioned purpose of taking material and every other sort of care of her, the woman. His stepmother knew it, his Cousin Robert knew it, ole Miss, he'd take his oath, more than half suspected it.
True, he had nothing whatever of his own, only a princely allowance from that big-souled person, his stepmother. But God Almighty, what of that? He'd have all that he needed having in his own good time. He was the stripe and make that batters any old thing out of the way of the going if it be mistaken enough to get there—the sort, in fact, that succeeds. The baffling thing here was of a different nature, being Selina herself. You can't crush a bud into its bloom by the mere force of your longing; you can't kiss a child that knows no passion, with passion!
Culpepper, twenty-three himself, but no less sophisticated than he would be when he was thirty-three, pulled himself together, big, good-looking young giant that he was, the effect of whose bodily presence here was always to further dwarf the shabby little parlor.
The soft flip of Auntie's cards being dealt out on the table came from the next room. It was like a restoring touch from her calm personality.
"One thing is cleared up for me by last night's happenings," declared Culpepper cheerfully.
"What?" from Selina. She had been thinking how comfy and nice it was, this long chatty evening with him, and the firelight, and the always restful sense of Auntie's proximity.
"Why, Tuttle, or Tuts, as we of his class at college called him, was in training for a color-sense those four years, matching suits to socks, and socks to neckties. But for that nicety for color so faithfully attained, where would little Mr. Bruce be right now?"
Auntie's voice came in from the next room. "Mr. Jones is a gentleman, and has proved it, Culpepper. I won't have you decrying him."