A Red Wallflower

'But if it is to your hurt, papa' —

'Not the question, my dear. About me it is of no consequence. The matter in hand is, that you should grow up to be a perfect woman – perfect as your mother was; that would have been her wish, and it is mine. To that all other things must give way. I wish you to have every information and every accomplishment that it is possible for you in this country to acquire.'

'Is there not as good a chance here as in England, papa?'

'What do you mean by "chance," my dear? Opportunity? No; there cannot yet be the same advantages here as in an old country, which has been educating its sons and its daughters in the most perfect way for hundreds of years.'

Esther pricked up her ears. The box of coins recurred to her memory, and sundry conversations held over it with Pitt Dallas. Whereby she had certainly got an impression that it was not so very long since England's educational provisions and practices, for England's daughters at least, had been open to great criticism, and displayed great lack of the desirable. 'Hundreds of years!' But she offered no contradiction to her father's remark.

'I would like you to be equal to any Englishwoman in your acquirements and accomplishments,' he repeated musingly. 'So far as in New York that is possible.'

'I will try what I can do, papa. And, after all, it depends more on the girl than on the school, does it not?'

'Humph! Well, a good deal depends on you, certainly. Did Miss Fairbairn find you backward in your studies, to begin with?'

'Papa,' said Esther slowly, 'I do not think she did.'

'Not in anything?'

'In French and music, of course.'

'Of course! But in history?'

'No, papa.'

'Nor in Latin?'

'Oh no, papa.'

'Then you can take your place well with the rest?'

'Perfectly, papa.'

'Do you like it? And does Miss Fairbairn approve of you? Has the week been pleasant?'

'Yes, sir. I like it very much, and I think she likes me – if only you get on well, papa. How have you been all these days?'

'Not very well. I think, not so well as at Seaforth. The air here does not agree with me. There is a rawness – I do not know what – a peculiar quality, which I did not find at Seaforth. It affects my breast disagreeably.'

'But, dear papa!' cried Esther in dismay, 'if this place does not agree with you, do not let us stay here! Pray do not for me!'

'My dear, I am quite willing to suffer a little for your good.'

'But if is bad for you, papa?'

'What does that matter? I do not expect to live very long in any case; whether a little longer or a little shorter, is most immaterial. I care to live only so far as I can be of service to you, and while you need me, my child.'

'Papa, when should I not need you?' cried Esther, feeling as if her breath were taken away by this view of things.

'The children grow up to be independent of the parents,' said the colonel, somewhat abstractly. 'It is the way of nature. It must be; for the old pass away, and the young step forward to fill their places. What I wish is that you should get ready to fill your place well. That is what we have come here for. We have taken the step, and we cannot go back.'

'Couldn't we, papa? if New York is not good for you?'

'No, my dear. We have sold our Seaforth place.'

'Mr. Dallas would sell it back again.'

'I shall not ask him. And neither do I desire to have it back, Esther.

I have come here on good grounds, and on those grounds I shall stay.

How I personally am affected by the change is of little consequence.'

The colonel, having by this time finished his third slice of toast and drunk up his tea, turned to his book. Esther remained greatly chilled and cast down. Was her advantage to be bought at the cost of shortening her father's life? Was her rich enjoyment of study and mental growth to be balanced by suffering and weariness on his part? – every day of her new life in school to be paid for by such a day's price at home? Esther could not bear to think it. She sat pondering, chewing the bitter cud of these considerations. She longed to discuss them further, and get rid, if possible, of her father's dismal conclusions; but with him she could not, and there was no other. When her father had settled and dismissed a subject, she could rarely re-open a discussion upon it. The colonel was an old soldier; when he had delivered an opinion, he had in a sort given his orders; to question was almost to be guilty of insubordination. He had gone back to his book, and Esther dared not say another word; all the more her thoughts burnt within her, and for a long time she sat musing, going over a great many things besides those they had been talking of.

'Papa,' she said, once when the colonel stirred and let his book fall for a minute, 'do you think Pitt Dallas will come home at all?'

'William Dallas! why should he not come home? His parents will want to see him. I have some idea they expect him to come over next summer.'

'To stay, papa?'

'To stay the vacation. He will go back again, of course, to keep his terms.'

'At Oxford?'

'Yes; and perhaps afterwards in the Temple.'

'The Temple, papa? what is that?'

'A school of law. Do you not know so much, Esther?'

'Is he going to be a lawyer?'

'His father wishes him to study for some profession, and in that he is as usual judicious. The fact that William will have a great deal of money does not affect the matter at all. It is my belief that every man ought to have a profession. It makes him more of a man.'

'Do you think Pitt will end by being an Englishman, papa?'

'I can't tell, my dear. That would depend on circumstances, probably. I should think it very likely, and very natural.'

'But he is an American.'

'Half.'

The colonel took up his book again.

'Papa,' said Esther eagerly, 'do you think Pitt will come to see us here?'

'Come to see us? If anything brings him to New York, I have no doubt he will look us up.'