Rose MacLeod

								

"Hasn't Peter told you?"
"Not a word."
"I came here expecting her to accept me as her brother's wife. She won't
do it."
"Won't do it? Does she say so?"
"She says nothing. But she ignores me." Her cheek took on a deeper
flush. She did not look at him, and he followed her gaze into the coals.
"You are too proud to give her proofs?" he hesitated.
She stirred uneasily in her chair.
"Proud!" she said bitterly. "If I had been proud, I should never have
come here at all. But I am here, and she must recognize me." Some
dauntless lines had come into the delicate face and made it older. "It
is absurd," she continued, "worse. Here am I living in your house--"
"No! no!" he corrected her. "Not that it matters. It would be yours just
the same. But it's grannie's house."
"Taking her hospitality,--oh, it's a shame! a shame!"
"Peter must make it right with Electra," he ventured.
"Peter! He has tried. He has tried too much. Things are not right
between them any more. I know that."
Osmond, almost with no conscious will, went back to what he had been
thinking when she came in.
"Peter belongs to your Brotherhood--"
"Don't say mine. It is my father's." She spoke with an unguarded warmth.
"But you belong to it, too."
"I used to. I used to do everything my father told me to--but not
now--not now!" She looked like a beautiful rebel, the color deepened in
her cheeks, her eyes darkening.
Osmond could not question her, but he went back to his own puzzle.
"The trouble is--about Peter--his painting has taken a back seat. He
talks about the Brotherhood--little else."
She nodded, looking at the fire.
"I know. I know."
"I've no objection to his believing in the brotherhood of man; but can't
the brotherhood of man be preserved if we paint our pictures, and mind
our own business generally?"
"Not while my father leads the procession. He will have no other gods
before him."
"Tell me about your father."
She turned on him a face suddenly irradiated by fun. An unexpected
dimple came to light, and Osmond's pulse responded to it.
"Electra," she said, "found time to propose that I should give a little
talk on my father. Last night I lay awake rehearsing it. Do you want to
hear it? Markham MacLeod is the chief of spoilers. He preaches the
brotherhood of man, and he gets large perquisites. He deals with
enormous issues. Kingdoms and principalities are under his foot because
the masses are his servitors. Money is always flowing through his hands.
He does not divert it, but it has, with the cheerful consent of his
followers, to take him from place to place, to shed his influence, to
pay his hotel bills--and he must live well, mind you. For he has to
speak. He has to lead. He is a vessel of the Lord." She had talked on
unhesitatingly, straight into the fire. Now, when she paused, Osmond
commented involuntarily,--
"How well you speak." Then as quickly, "Does your father know you think