Another outbreak of passion followed when he applied to his father for
assistance during a precarious passage through the risks and dangers of
an expanding business, and was met with reluctant excuses that seemed the
very acme of ingratitude. He hurled forth an indignant reminder of all
the services he had performed for the family--services at once degrading
and gratuitous; and he demanded if a year's dabbling in such delectable
detail were not a sufficient warrant for asking the help that he now
required. In fact, he hectored his father as unscrupulously, as
unceremoniously, as he had browbeaten Belden.
David Marshall met as well as he could the demands of his choleric son;
never before had he been trampled on rough-shod by one of his own
children. He almost seemed to see the moral fibre of Roger's nature
coarsening--perhaps disintegrating--under his very eyes, and he asked
himself half reproachfully how much this might be due to tasks of his own
imposition.
All these things had their place in his mind as he followed Bingham
through the new house, scuffing over the plaster-encrusted floors,
watching the adjustment of window-weights, or drawing back before the
long, thin strips of moulding brought in by carpenters. No, his children
did not love him. There was Rosy, who had learned her lesson of
selfishness from the world all too early, and who now, in her
preoccupations for the future, had less thought of him than ever.
Pages:
283
284
285
286
287
288
289
290
291
292
293
294
295
296
297
298
299
300
301
302
303
304
305
306
307