"
"Be careful what you say, Margaret!"
"I must say it," she replied. "I've encouraged you to talk in detail,
because I wanted to be sure I was right in the position I was taking; but
you've given me a different viewpoint. Why James, think it over yourself
in the light of what you just have told me. Nellie never has been a mother
at all! Her heart is more barren than that of a woman to whom motherhood
is physical impossibility, yet whose heart aches with maternal instinct!"
"Margaret!" cried James Minturn.
"James, it's true!" she persisted. "I never have understood. For fear of
that, I led you on and now look what you've told me. Nellie never had a
chance at natural motherhood. The thing called society made a foolish
mother to begin with, while she in turn ruined her daughter, and if
Elizabeth had lived it would have been passed on to her. You throw a new
light on Nellie. As long as she was herself, she was tender and loving,
and you adored her; if you had been alone and moderately circumstanced,
she would have continued being so lovable that after ten years your face
flushes with painful memory as you speak of it.
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