"My dear! What about my three children?" "Three healthy children! What do you know of the real child, the afflicted child, like my Mortimore? Why, I'd see Freddy in her grave before I'd--" She stopped short. "I--I love both my children exactly the same," she ended, weakly. Then broke out again: "You and I were brought up to do our duty, and not talk about it whether it was pleasant or unpleasant. And let me tell you, if Freddy would do her duty to her brother, as old Aunt Adelaide did to her invalid brother, she'd be a thousand times happier than she is now, mixing up with perfectly common people, and talking about earning her own living! Yes, that's the last bee in her bonnet,--Working! a girl with a good home, and nothing on earth to do but amuse herself. She uses really vulgar words about women who never worked for their living; you and me, for instance. 'Vermin'--no, 'parasites.' Disgusting! Yes; if Freddy was like her great-aunt Adelaide--" Mrs. Payton, sinking into a chair bubbly with springs and down, was calmer, but she wiped her eyes once or twice: "Aunt Adelaide gave up her life to poor Uncle Henry. Everybody says she had lots of beaux! I heard she had seven offers. But she never dreamed of getting married. She just lived for her brother. And they say _he_ was dreadful, Bessie; whereas my poor Mortimore is only--not quite like other people." Mrs. Childs gasped. "When Morty was six months old," Mrs. Payton said, in a tense voice, "and we began to be anxious about him, Andrew said to the doctor, 'I suppose the brat' (you know men speak so frankly) 'has no brains?' and Dr. Davis said, 'The intellect is there, Mr. Payton, but it is veiled.' That has always been such a comfort to me; Morty's intellect is _there_! And besides, you must remember, Bessie, that even if he isn't--very intelligent, he's a _man_, so he's really the head of the family. As for Freddy, as I say, if she would follow her aunt Adelaide's example, instead of reading horrid books about things that when _I_ was a young lady, girls didn't know existed, she'd be a good deal more comfortable to live with. Oh, dear! what am I going to do about her? As I wrote to Mr. Weston, when I asked him to come in this afternoon, what are we going to do about her?" "What has poor Fred done now?" Fred's aunt asked, trying patiently to shut off the torrent of talk. Mrs. Payton drew a long breath; her chin was still unsteady. "It isn't so much this last performance, because, of course, in spite of what Mama says, everybody who knows Freddy, knows that there was--nothing wrong. But it's her ideas, and the way she talks. Really, Bessie--" "My dear, they all talk most unpleasantly!"