By Lent Marcia was worried about her, and was giving tonics again.
"He never will be the man for her," John said. "He has already reached his limit. A hundred to a hundred and twenty-five a month is all he'll ever be worth. He has no initiative. I know that type of young fellow. Steady and accurate enough; but there will always be scores of others who would do his work just as well."
"But he's a good boy, John, and if he never does give her luxuries, what's our money for?"
"Not to ruin our children, surely, dear. Are there to be no men in the family because there's a little cash? I don't know myself what it's for," he went on. "Ward apparently will never be able even to take care of it." Marcia's forehead dropped to her arm. "He does no more at the store than the other trifling clerks who do just enough to draw their pay. I used to think of myself at this time of life getting out of harness somewhat, with younger shoulders to take the pull. I thought I was building for the boy. He seems to have no feeling of obligation or gratitude."
"I doubt," Marcia said, "if it's any use to expect them to repay us in our way; or if we have the right. They have been paying us back all along. They have given us life, as truly as we them. And for the rest, I believe love and service are constants, like energy and matter: we do something for some one; he doesn't return it, but some one else does; or he does to some one else. Often it looks pretty remote, to be sure; parents who do most don't always get most, and their children don't always make the best parents; but the children of selfish children are often the salt of the earth. So the balance is struck. Ours will do their share one way or another. Edith is asking for her chance now."
"You are advocating this foolish marriage, Marcia."
"Yes, I believe I am now." She reached a hand toward him in an instinctive effort to get in touch. "It was a desperate disappointment to me at first. I thought Ward had my tastes and temperament and might do the things I couldn't—being a woman; the things I gave up,—for him. Then I hoped something from Edith. At least I wanted to keep her fresh for some fine marriage. I couldn't think that boy—he's a nice boy, John—could be the man. But I'm coming to see that we are the ones to profit by our experiences, not other people. We have no right to relive our lives in the children. They may be very different, and they have the right of personality. I might have allowed that to myself, too, long ago." She paused in brief memory. "It is them, their happiness, we must consider. Mere love is of no value unless it understands and sympathizes; and to have people do the wrong thing for you in its name is only a thorn in the flesh. Edith and Hastings must decide for themselves; and now that I admit that, I can see that they belong to each other, John. They—don't you see what I mean?—they chime perfectly. It's temperament, tastes, interests, points of view. What luck! They have all that, besides a love as fundamental as ours. And then, when all is said and done, it isn't the same as if they could ever really want."
John sat thoughtfully playing with her hand, brushing the finger-tips absently across his lips. At last he straightened up with a sigh. "Maybe, maybe. But if Ward was too young to know his mind, so is Edith now. And," decisively, "if you're wrong the damage would be beyond help; if you're right, a year won't change it. We'll try Europe for Edith till next spring."
Europe! It had no charms for Marcia, with John and Ward on this side. And to send Edith without her seemed equally impossible. Ward needed her as much as Edith, though he could not have seemed farther off in China. She knew little of what he did. He was always out at night, late coming in. One thing she knew,—the coming-in was steady; she never missed that step in the dark past her door. Sometimes when small clues made her distrustful of some particular occasion, chance would show her it had been most innocent. But for the most part she knew nothing. Direct questions he resented as interference or curiosity. He was at an age especially jealous of his (dubious?) independence and manhood. If he would only fall in love, Marcia thought; anything for an incentive! Things didn't come to the right people or at the right
