"I'm afraid I'm a failure as a girl," Jean confessed, "but perhaps I'll
get more charming as I get older. Look at Pamela!"
"Oh, _Miss Reston_," said David, in the tone that he might have said
"Helen of Troy." ... "But seriously, Jean, I think you are using your
money in a very dull way. You see, you're so dashed _helpful_. What
makes you want to think all the time about slum children?... I think
you'd better present your money all in a lump to the Government as a
drop in the ocean of the National Debt."
"I'll not give it to the Government," said Jean, "but we may count
ourselves lucky if they don't thieve it from us. I'm at one with Bella
Bathgate when she says, 'I'm no verra sure aboot thae politicians
Liberal _or_ Tory.' I think she fears that any day they may grab
Hillview from her."
"Anyway," David persisted, "we might have a car. I learned to drive at
Oxford. It would be frightfully useful, you know, a little car."
"Useful!" laughed Jean. "Have you written any more, Davie?"
David explained that the term had been a very busy one, and that his
time had been too much occupied for any outside work, and Jean
understood that the stimulus of poverty having been removed David had
fallen into easier ways. And why not--at nineteen?
"We must think about a car. Do you know all about the different makes?
We mustn't be rash."
David assured her that he would make all inquiries and went out of the
room whistling blithely. Jean, left alone, sat thinking. Was the money
to be a treasure to her or the reverse? It was fine to give David what
he wanted, to know that Jock and Mhor could have the best of everything,
but their wants would grow and grow; simple tastes and habits were
easily shed, and luxurious ways easily learned. Would the possession of
money spoil the boys? She sighed, and then smiled rather ruefully as she
thought of David and his smart maids and motors and his desire to turn
her into a modern girl. It was very natural and very boyish of him.
"He'll have the face ett off me," said Jean, quoting the Irish R.M....
Richard Plantagenet hadn't minded her being old-fashioned.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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