Page:The Fruit of the Tree (Wharton 1907).djvu/197

Rh he married her! They were her particular form of contact with life, the expression of her relation to her fellow-men, her pretext, her opportunity—unless they were merely a vast purse in which to plunge for her pin-money! He had fancied it would rest with him to determine from which of these stand—points she should view Westmore; and at the outset she had enthusiastically viewed it from his. In her eager adoption of his ideas she had made a pet of the mills, organizing the Mothers’ Club, laying out a recreation-ground on the Hopewood property, and playing with pretty plans in water-colour for the Emergency Hospital and the building which was to contain the night-schools, library and gymnasium; but even these minor projects—which he had urged her to take up as a means of learning their essential dependence on his larger scheme—were soon to be set aside by obstacles of a material order. Bessy always wanted money—not a great deal, but, as she reasonably put it, “enough”—and who was to blame if her father and Mr. Tredegar, each in his different capacity, felt obliged to point out that every philanthropic outlay at Westmore must entail a corresponding reduction in her income? Perhaps if she could have been oftener at Hanaford these arguments would have been counteracted, for she was tender-hearted, and prompt to relieve such suffering as she saw about her; but her imagination was not active, and it was easy for her to [ 181 ]