It is all the winds of the world, and all the
fires of the centre. You surely cannot be serious in asking it to take,
in exchange, some obsolete objection against its beloved!
CHAPTER XXXIX
MIKE AFAR
This collision with her father braced up Esther's nerves, and made
Mike's absence easier to bear. Her father made no more allusion to it.
He was entering that period when fathers, however despotic, content
themselves with protest, where once they have governed by royal
proclamation. He was losing heart to contend with his children. They
must go their own ways--though it must not be without occasional severe
and solemn warnings on his part.
Mike and Esther wrote to each other twice a week. They had talked of
every day, but a wise instinct prompted them to the less romantic, but
likely the more enduring arrangement. It would be none the less open to
them to write fourteen letters a week if they wished, but to have had to
admit that one letter a day was a serious tax, not only on one's other
occupations, including idleness, but also on the amount of
subject-matter available, would have been a dangerous correction of an
impulsive miscalculation.
Pages:
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307
308
309
310