"He's about done for himself, I should say," he continued. Without
saying anything, he took Katharine's letters out of her hand, adjusted
his eyeglasses, and read them through.
At length he said "Humph!" and gave the letters back to her.
"Mother knows nothing about it," Katharine remarked. "Will you tell
her?"
"I shall tell your mother. But I shall tell her that there is nothing
whatever for us to do."
"But the marriage?" Katharine asked, with some diffidence.
Mr. Hilbery said nothing, and stared into the fire.
"What in the name of conscience did he do it for?" he speculated at
last, rather to himself than to her.
Katharine had begun to read her aunt's letter over again, and she now
quoted a sentence. "Ibsen and Butler. . . . He has sent me a letter
full of quotations--nonsense, though clever nonsense."
"Well, if the younger generation want to carry on its life on those
lines, it's none of our affair," he remarked.
"But isn't it our affair, perhaps, to make them get married?"
Katharine asked rather wearily.
"Why the dickens should they apply to me?" her father demanded with
sudden irritation.
"Only as the head of the family--"
"But I'm not the head of the family.
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