There are two
me's, it seems--one what I want and the other what I am. I want Jim and
I'm Mariana Jannan. All that about Eunice or Essie, or whatever her name
was, doesn't matter a bawbee, as you say. I hate it because I think at
times it makes him unhappy. Really, I believe I am fonder of him because
of it. We owe him something--the superior Jannans and Pennys. Why,
Howat, he's your own blood, and you looked at him as if he were a
grocer's assistant. And I watched hatefully for the little expressions
that seemed common. Of course, out in those mills, he would pick up a
lot that wouldn't touch us; and, after all, he could drop them."
"If you have any thought of reforming him," he commented dryly, "you
might as well see a wedding stationer."
"I could influence him," she insisted; "I'd at least count for as much
as those shovellers and furnace men."
"But not," he proceeded relentlessly, "against the Essie Scofield you
dismissed so easily. I don't doubt for a minute the unhappiness you
spoke of; it would he a part of his inheritance; and you'd never charm
it out of him. Damn it, Mariana," he burst out, "he's inferior! That's
all, inferior." Anger and resentment destroyed his caution, his planned
logic, restraint.
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