The Evil Genius: A Domestic Story — page 77: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

66 THE EVIL GENIUS. ‘‘Thank you: I begin to understand; I am to be turned out of me house. Very well. Weshall see what my daughter says to that.” ‘* You know as well as I do, Mrs. Presty, that if your daugh- ter is forced to choose between us she will decide for her hus- band. You have the night before you for consideration. I have no more to say.” Among Mrs. Presty’s merits, it is only just to reckon a cas pacity for making up her mind rapidly under stress of circum- stances. Before Linley had opened the door, on his way out, he was called back. ‘*T am shocked to trouble you again,” Mrs. Presty said, ‘‘ but I don’t propose to interfere with my night’s rest by thinking about you. My position is perfectly clear to me, without wast- ing time in consideration. When a man so completely forgets what is due to the weaker sex as to threaten a woman, the woman has no alternative but to submit. You are aware that I had arranged to see my daughter to-morrow morning. I yield to brute force, sir. Tell your wife that I sha]Jl not keep my ap- pointment. Are you satisfied ?” | ‘* Quite satisfied,” Linley said, and left the room. His mother-in-law looked after him with a familiar expression of opinion, and a smile of supreme contempt. ‘You fool!” Only two words; and yet there seemed to be some hidden meaning in them, which gently tickled Mrs. Presty in the region assigned by phrenologists to the sense of self-esteem. CHAPTER XII. TWO OF THEM SLEEP BADLY. WAITING for Sydney to come into the bedroom as usual and wish her good-night. Kitty was astonished by the appearance of her grandmother, entering on tiptoe from the corridor, with a small paper parcel in her hand. ‘‘ Whisper!” said Mrs. Presty, pointing to the open door of communication with Mrs. Linley’s room. ‘‘ This is your birth- day present. You mustn’t look at it till you wake to-morrow morning.” She pushed the parcel under the pillow, and, in- stead of saying good-night, took a chair and sat down. ‘“May I show my present,” Kitty asked, ‘‘ when I go to mamma in the morning ?” The present hidden under the paper wrapper was a sixpenny picture-book. Kitty’s grandmother disapproved of spending money lavishly on birthday gifts to children. ‘Show it of course; and take the greatest care of it,” Mrs. Presty answered, gravely. ‘‘ But tell me one thing, my dear, wouldn’t you like to see all your presents early in the morning, like mine ?” Still smarting under the recollection of her interview with her son-in-law, Mrs. Presty had certain ends to gain in putting this idea into the child’s head. It was her special object to raise domestic obstacles to a private interview between the husband and wife during the earlier hours of the day. If the giftg ECOMMICLOOOKS (c©)