But still I beg you won't look at
them. You know enough now, for you know that he, with his associates,
does not merit such great confidence as you have latterly reposed in
him.
COLONEL (_sadly_).
Well, well! In my old days I have had bad luck with my acquaintances.
ADELAIDE.
If you put Oldendorf and this one (_pointing to the letters_) in the
same class you are quite mistaken.
COLONEL.
I don't do that, girl. For Senden I had no such affection, and that's
why it is easier to bear it when he does me an injury.
ADELAIDE (_gently_).
And because you loved the other one, that was the reason why yesterday
you were so--
COLONEL.
Say it, mentor--so harsh and violent!
ADELAIDE.
Worse than that, you were unjust.
COLONEL.
I said the same thing to myself last night, as I went to Ida's room
and heard the poor thing cry. I was a hurt, angry man and was wrong in
the form--but in the matter itself I was, all the same, right. Let him
be member of Parliament; he may be better suited for it than I. It is
his being a newspaper writer that separates us.
ADELAIDE.
But he is only doing what you did yourself!
COLONEL.
Don't remind me of that folly! Were he as my son-in-law to hold a
different opinion from mine regarding current happenings--that I could
doubtless stand. But if day by day he were to proclaim aloud to the
world feelings and sentiments the opposite of mine, and I had to read
them, and had to hear my son-in-law reproached and laughed at for them
on all sides by old friends and comrades, and I had to swallow it
all--you see that is more than I could bear!
ADELAIDE.
Pages:
105
106
107
108
109
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129