You never did, mama. You
have always looked down on me in some superior way as though you knew a
great deal and I very little. It isn't that way at all. It isn't true. I
know what I am about. I know what I am doing. I love Mr. Witla, and I am
going to live with him. Mrs. Witla understands. She knows how it is. You
will. I don't care anything at all about what people think. I don't care
what any society friends do. They are not making my life. They are all
just as narrow and selfish as they can be, anyhow. Love is something
different from that. You don't understand me. I love Eugene, and he is
going to have me, and I am going to have him. If you want to try to
wreck my life and his, you may, but it won't make any difference. I will
have him, anyhow. We might just as well quit talking about it now."

"Quit talking about it? Quit talking about it? Indeed, I haven't even
begun talking yet. I am just trying to collect my wits, that's all. You
are raging in insanity. This thing will never be. It will nev-er be. You
are just a poor, deluded slip of girl, whom I have failed to watch
sufficiently. From now on, I will do my duty by you, if God spares me.
You need me. Oh, how you need me. Poor little Suzanne!"

"Oh, hush, mama! Stop the hysteria," interrupted Suzanne.

"I will call up Mr. Colfax. I will call up Mr. Winfield. I will have him
discharged. I will expose him in the newspapers. The scoundrel, the
villain, the thief! Oh, that I should have lived to see this day. That I
should have lived to have seen this day!"

"That's right, mama," said Suzanne, wearily. "Go on. You are just
talking, you know, and I know that you are. You cannot change me.
Talking cannot. It is silly to rave like this, I think. Why won't you be
quiet? We may talk, but needn't scream."

Mrs. Dale put her hands to her temples. Her brain seemed to be whirling.

"Never mind, now," she said. "Never mind. I must have time to think. But
this thing you are thinking will never be. It never will be. Oh! Oh!"
and she turned sobbing to the window.

Suzanne merely stared. What a peculiar thing emotions were in
people--their emotions over morals. Here was her mother, weeping, and
she was looking upon the thing her mother was crying about as the most
essential and delightful and desirable thing. Certainly life was
revealing itself to her rapidly these days. Did she really love Eugene
so much? Yes, yes, yes, indeed. A thousand times yes. This was not a
tearful e