“You will not put any faith in that, father. Who am I, that I should either make or mar?”
“I am tempted to think so myself,” he said, with a smile; “but at your age people are seldom so wise. You are like your mother, my dear, and, I doubt not, would be a tower of strength to your husband, as I have good reason to say she has been; but that is not to say that any man has a right to put the responsibility of his being to another’s charge. No, no; I would not say that. But there is no harm in the lad, Elsie. He has good dispositions. I would be at ease in my mind about your future, if you could find it in your heart to trust it to him.”
“Father,” cried Elsie, very earnestly, “I care no more about him than I do for old Adam, your old caddie. Just the same, neither more nor less.”
Her father laughed, and said that was not encouraging for Frank.
“But, my dear,” he said, “they say a lassie’s mind is as light as air, and blows this way and that way, like the turn of the tide.”
“They may say what they like, father,” cried Elsie, with some indignation. “If you think my mother is like that, then your daughter can have no reason to complain.”
“Bless me, no,” cried Mr. Buchanan; “your mother! that makes all the difference.”
These were the same words that Mrs. Buchanan had said. “As if because she was my mother she was not a woman, and because he was my father he was not a man,” said Elsie to herself; “and where is the difference?” But she understood all the same.
“I will not say another word,” said the minister. “If you care for him no more than for old Adam, there is not another word to say; but I would have been glad, on my own account, if you could have liked him, Elsie. It would have been a compensation. No matter, no matter, we’ll say no more.”
Elsie would have been more touched if her father had not alluded to that compensation. She had within herself a moment of indignation. “Me, a compensation,” she cried to herself, “for your weary three hundred pounds. It is clear to me papa does not think his daughter very muckle worth, though he makes a difference for his wife!”