"It is all very well for your father to say such things, but, Nancy,
darling, you shall not be put upon by Tramplers" proceeds Mrs. Ellicott in
her most cryptically perfect tones. "Oliver is a man--he must apologize.
A man, I say, though little more than a boy. And otherwise you would now
be pursuing your Art in Paris due to dear kind Mrs. Winters who has always
stood our truest friend and now this other opportunity has come also but I
would never be the first to say that even such should not be sacrificed
most gladly for the love of a true kind husband and dear little children
though marriage is but a lottery at best and especially when affections
are fixed upon their object in early youth."
All this without a pause, pouring over the numbed parts of Nancy's mind
like thin sweetish oil. Nancy considers wearily. Yes, Oliver should
apologize. Yes, it is only being properly dignified not to call up the
Rosario again to find if he is there. Yes, if he truly loves her, he will
call--he will come--and the clock hands are marching on toward ten-seven
and his train like stiff little soldiers and mother is talking, talking--
"Not that I wish or have wished to influence your mind in any way, my
darling, but environment and propinquity count for mountains in such first
youthful attachments and sometimes when we are older to be looked back
upon with such regret.
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