And, perhaps, Peyton wanted a housewife; though heaven knows
he hasn't turned to one. It's her blonde, no bland, charm and
destructive air of innocence. I've admitted and understood too much;
but I couldn't help it--my mother and grandmother, all that lot, were
the same way, and went after things themselves. The men hated sham and
sentimentality; they asked, and gave, nothing."
Fanny, it was evident, was growing impatient at what was not without
its challenge of her character and expressed convictions. "I do agree
with you, Claire, that we are not alike," she admitted. Her voice bore
a perceptible note of complacency, of superior strength and position.
"Just last week I was telling Lee that I belonged before the war--
things were so different then, and, apparently, it's only in my house
they haven't changed. We are frightfully behind the times, and you'd be
surprised at how glad we are. It was your mother's father, wasn't it,
who fell in love with the Spanish woman while he was in the Embassy at
Seville? My family weren't people of public connections, although a
great-aunt married Senator Carlinton; but they had the highest
principles."
"They were lucky," Claire Morris replied indifferently; "I am beginning
to think it isn't what you have so much as what happens to it. Anyhow,
Peyton is going away with Mina Raff, and I am sorry for him; he's so
young and so certain; but this has shaken him.
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