This is the last day of August, and it is a day
Twickenham Town is going to remember for
a long time. I have done again that which I
should not have done, and I guess I had better go
home. I had expected to stay until the twenty-seventh
of September and return with Father, who
was to spend a week here with me, but he can't come.
I suppose it was the awful disappointment of
knowing Father couldn't come, and being so miserable
myself (not one line yet from that person named
William Spencer Sloane, who is probably married
to an elderly woman by this time), and because
of my sureness that no human being could be
depended on in time of temptation, especially
vigorous, aggressive temptations that come out
of the West, that I gave help where help seemed
to be needed, and now again I am in everybody's
mouth. Also my ankles are still a little sore from
the weight of the window being on them as I hung
out, but they are nearly well, and even if they
were not it would not matter. Two young hearts
are happy and a proud person is not, and the
blame is on me. That also doesn't matter. I am
soon going away.
The thing I did, which maybe I shouldn't have
done, was to help little Amy Frances Winston
get married. She is the property of her
grandmother, who is a very important part of
Twickenham Town. Having no parents or sisters or
brothers, and only enough money of her own for
her keep, and no spunk or spirit, she has gone on
for years loving an awfully nice chap named
Taylor French, with little chance of ever marrying
him, and then in hops this Miss Frisk, who asks
her why she doesn't quit fumbling and stop fearing,
and the thing is done.
There is nothing the matter with Taylor French
except he is not Ancestral. Mrs. Brandon, Amy's
grandmother, is diseased on the subject of
ancestry, and the first thing she asks about a man
is who is he. Knowing she would want to know
who I was, I mentioned to her one day that I
had never had any grandparents on either side
(living ones I meant), and that we were not
historic, and no member of our family had ever
been distinguished (for righteousness, though I
didn't use the word), and that we had made our
own way in life, which was true, for Father didn't
have a thing but what he was making when he
married Mother. I also told her I did not mind
in the least, and if I did I would try to remember
that Christ was a carpenter and St. Paul a
sail-maker, though I'd never care to be intimate
with St. Paul. And I told her I thought it was
yourself that counted most, after all, and not dead
people, though it must be nice to know somebody
in your family had been something if you were not.
All she said was, "Are you a suffragist?" When
I said I was and I hoped I didn't look as if I
were not, for I wouldn't like anybody to be
mistaken about it, she gave me a long look and left
the room.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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