Page:The Confessions of a Well-Meaning Woman.djvu/168

 attract men. I’m open to any offer; the man mustn’t be too hopeless a cad, that’s all.” This mock-desperation would have been very cynical if it had not been so unconvincing. I said nothing at the time; but, when I had a moment alone with her poor mother, I did feel it my duty to say candidly that it was time somebody did something to change the girl’s thoughts. Ruth agreed, but in a helpless, hopeless way that always makes me wonder how Brackenbury has put up with her for so many years. In her opinion, Phyllida was pining for her young soldier and would continue to pine, so far as I could gather, until she found him.

“Is it not better,” I asked, “to face facts? Colonel Butler was certainly attracted, but he realized in time that he had hardly the means or the position to qualify him as husband to Phyllida and son-in-law to Brackenbury. Very properly he made himself scarce; and nothing in life became him so well as his leaving of it. You say he has not written? He won’t write;—and I respect him for it. But, goodness me, I hope you’re not going to encourage Phyllida to think that she’s broken her heart in a hopeless passion. If you won’t send her right away (as, you will have the justice to remember, I felt it my duty to suggest at the outset), let her come