It was not only the ants that came in for lectures. I
preached sternly to myself.
"Well, Dawn old girl, you've made a beautiful mess of
it. A smashed-up wreck at twenty-eight! And what have
you to show for it? Nothing! You're a useless pulp,
like a lemon that has been squeezed dry. Von Gerhard was
right. There must be no more newspaper work for you, me
girl. Not if you can keep away from the fascination of
it, which I don't think you can."
Then I would fall to thinking of those years of
newspapering--of the thrills of them, and the ills of
them. It had been exhilarating, and educating, but
scarcely remunerative. Mother had never approved. Dad
had chuckled and said that it was a curse descended upon
me from the terrible old Kitty O'Hara, the only old maid
in the history of the O'Haras, and famed in her
day for a caustic tongue and a venomed pen. Dad and
Mother--what a pair of children they had been! The very
dissimilarity of their natures had been a bond between
them. Dad, light-hearted, whimsical, care-free,
improvident; Mother, gravely sweet, anxious-browed,
trying to teach economy to the handsome Irish husband
who, descendant of a long and royal line of spendthrift
ancestors, would have none of it.
Pages:
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41
42
43
44
45
46