"Well, wash your face first and let me brush your hair while you talk."
So Annie got up and bathed her face, and while I combed and brushed her thick, yellow hair, she told me the following tale:
"You see, Page, my Father is an Englishman and he is awfully proud. He does not understand a little girl a bit nor did he understand my beautiful Mother. He loved her, though, adored her, in fact, and I know has never been happy one minute since she died; that's been about four years now. He does not love me, though, I am afraid; but maybe I do him an injustice and don't understand him. Anyhow, he is never chummy and chatty with me like Mr. Tucker is with Tweedles."
"I bet he does love you, Annie. My Father is not so intimate with me as Mr. Tucker is with his girls, but I know he loves me. You see, Mr. Tucker is almost the same age as his daughters and I fancy your Father is much older than you are, just as mine is." And I went on brushing her hair, knowing she was becoming calmer and beginning rather to enjoy talking about herself.
"My Father, you know, is very well born; in fact, his Father was a baronet of very ancient stock and his elder brother now has the title and estates. Father was educated for the church. He has an Oxford degree and is very scholarly. However, after all his education, he did not want to take orders. He felt that he had no vocation for the ministry, and he and my grandfather had an awful row about it. You see, English younger sons have to do something. Mother told me all this. Father has never mentioned it to me. He occasionally reminds me that I am of good birth and that is his only reference to England. Immediately after this row with Grandfather, he met Mother and fell in love with her at first sight. It was at a Charity Bazaar."
"Oh——!" I exclaimed involuntarily, but made out I was sneezing. I remembered the conversation I had held with Harvie Price about Mrs. Pore and the Charity Bazaar.
"Mother's people are noble, too. She was the daughter of a younger son of the Earl of Garth, but she had not a penny to her name. When she met my Father, she was visiting some very wealthy relatives who were interested in her and preparing to launch her on the concert stage. Mother had a wonderful voice, you know."
"Yes, Harvie Price told me that all the old sinners in your county went to church to hear her sing."
"Well, Mother fell in love, too, and in spite of all that her rich relatives had to say about her career, she married Father; and then what did Grandfather, Sir Isaac Pore, do but stop Father's allowance? It was not very much but it was enough for the young couple to live on if they lived very simply. Sir Isaac thought he could force Father into taking orders; but Father was opposed to doing this, feeling he was not suited to the Church, and Mother upheld him in his resolve."
"They were right, I think. It seems an awful sin to me for a man just to go into the ministry for a living," I ventured.