"No."
"Then I can tell you--I, who drove your mother from my house when she
refused to wed a man she did not love."
Delight's great eyes widened with wonder.
"Yes," went on the elder woman with impetuous haste, "look at me. I
have grown older and wiser since those days. But I was proud when I
was young, and self-willed, and determined to have my way. I had three
daughters: Maida, whom you see here, Delight and Muriel. We lived in
Virginia and my children's beauty was the talk of the county. Maida
married Richard Galbraith, a descendant of one of our oldest families,
and I rejoiced in the alliance. For Delight, my second daughter, I
chose as husband the son of one of my oldest friends, a rich young
landholder who although older than she I knew would bring her name and
fortune. But the girl, high-spirited like myself but lacking my
ambition, would have none of him. All unbeknown to any of us, she had
fallen in love with Ralph Hathaway, a handsome, penniless adventurer
from the West. There was nothing against the man save that he was
young, headstrong, and had his way to make, but he balked me in my
plans and I hated him for it.
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