e said only, that anyone might go to
Italy if they liked. She said, ''Would you have everyone stop at the Alps, because
you were meant to go to Italy once, and were kept from it? Don''t make Priscilla
miserable over this. Your father was her father too. Do you think it hasn''t been
hard for her, to have to hold her wedding off?''
I said that I remembered how Priscilla had cried herself into a fit when Pa
was first found to be ill—that was because she had had a dozen new gowns
made, that must be all returned and sent back black. When I wept, I asked her,
what did they do with me?
She answered, not looking at me, that when I had wept it had been different.
She said, ''Priscilla was nineteen, and very ordinary. She has had two hard years.
We should be glad that Mr Barclay has been so patient.''
I said, rather sourly, that she and Stephen had been luckier; and she
answered levelly: ''We were, Margaret—because we were able to marry and
have your father see it. Priscilla won''t have that, but her wedding will be finer
without your poor pa''s illness to rush the planning of it. Let her enjoy it, won''t
you?''
I stood, and went to the fireplace and put my hands before the flames. I said
at last, that she was stern to-day; that it was dandling her baby and being a
mother that did that to her. ''Indeed, Mrs Prior, you sound like my own mother.