Page:Small Souls (1919).djvu/395

Rh peace and affection, than to grow old here beside my mother and my brothers and sisters; but, if there must be a scandal, notwithstanding those simple wishes, well then a scandal there shall be, so that people can say, with truth, ‘Mrs. van der Welcke is pushing herself into the circles to which she always used to belong.’”

“I can’t do it!” he said, weakly. “I can’t possibly do what you want. After putting up with the tolerance and condescension of my former friends, I can’t go to them now and explain that my wife and I want to call on them and their wives and expect them to call on us in return.”

“Then I’ll do without you!” she said. “I’m not on speaking terms with Adolphine, but I don’t need that jumble-set of hers. I believe that Bertha still has some sisterly affection left for me; and I shall talk to her and she will have to help me. But you will never be able to reproach me again with not thinking of my child’s future. And, if you’re too weak to show your friends what you expect of them, then I, later, when our son meets with difficulties in his career, shall have the right to reproach you as you are reproaching me now. . . .”

“Reproach! I’m not thinking of reproaches!” he broke in, angrily, illogically, unreasonably. “I’m only thinking of that rotten paper, that rotten paper. . . .”

He looked at it in despairing irritation:

“I’ll go to the fellow, I’ll slash him across the face, I’ll slash him across the face!”