can no more scold people into loving us than nature could make buds
blossom by daily nipping them with frost. And yet she made her
children uncomfortable by causing them to feel that it was unnatural
and wrong that they did not care more for their mother. This was
especially true of Edith, who tried to satisfy her conscience, as we
have seen, by bringing costly presents and delicacies that were seldom
needed or appreciated.

Edith soon became so oppressed by her mother's sighs and silence and
the heavy perfumed air, that she sprang up, and pressing a remorseful
kiss on the white thin face, said:

"I must dress for dinner, mamma: I will send your maid," and vanished
also.




CHAPTER II

A FUTURE OF HUMAN DESIGNING



The dining-room at six o'clock wore a far more cheerful aspect than
the invalid's room upstairs. It was furnished in a costly manner, but
more ostentatiously than good taste would dictate. You instinctively
felt that it was a sacred place to the master of the house, in which
he daily sacrificed to one of his chosen deities.