"Mother," said Elsie sternly, "please don't misunderstand. I should never have spoken of this if I had been 'wroth' with him—in that way."
"Of course not, dear; I understand. And it would never do, anyway, for father doesn't like the blood."
"Father doesn't like the—what, mother?"
Elsie asked the question half an hour later, as they sat in an adjoining section, waiting for their berths to be made up.
"What, dear?"
"What did you say father doesn't like—in the Castants?"
"Oh, the blood, the family. This generation is all right—apparently. But blood will tell. You are too young to know all the old histories that fathers and mothers read young people by."
"I think we are what we are," said Elsie; "we are not our great-grandfathers."
"In a measure we are, and it should teach us charity. Not as much can be expected of Billy Castant, coming of the stock he does, as you might expect of that ancestry," and Mrs. Valentin nodded toward the formidable Eastern contingent. (Elsie was consciously hating them already.) "The fountain can rise no higher than its source."
"I thought there was supposed to be a source a little higher than the ground—unless we are no more than earth-born fountains."