3 Books To Know Pulitzer Prize for Fiction. Edith Wharton

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      “Second childhood!” George muttered, shaking his head; and he thought sadly that the Major had not long to live. However, this surmise depressed him for only a moment or so. Of course, people couldn't be expected to live forever, and it would be a good thing to have someone in charge of the Estate who wouldn't let it get to looking so rusty that riffraff dared to make fun of it. For George had lately undergone the annoyance of calling upon the Morgans, in the rather stuffy red velours and gilt parlour of their apartment at the hotel, one evening when Mr. Frederick Kinney also was a caller, and Mr. Kinney had not been tactful. In fact, though he adopted a humorous tone of voice, in expressing his sympathy for people who, through the city's poverty in hotels, were obliged to stay at the Amberson, Mr. Kinney's intention was interpreted by the other visitor as not at all humorous, but, on the contrary, personal and offensive.

      George rose abruptly, his face the colour of wrath. “Good-night, Miss Morgan. Good-night, Mr. Morgan,” he said. “I shall take pleasure in calling at some other time when a more courteous sort of people may be present.”

      “Look here!” the hot-headed Fred burst out. “Don't you try to make me out a boor, George Minafer! I wasn't hinting anything at you; I simply forgot all about your grandfather owning this old building. Don't you try to put me in the light of a boor! I won't—”

      But George walked out in the very course of this vehement protest, and it was necessarily left unfinished.

      Mr. Kinney remained only a few moments after George's departure; and as the door closed upon him, the distressed Lucy turned to her father. She was plaintively surprised to find him in a condition of immoderate laughter.

      “I didn't—I didn't think I could hold out!” he gasped, and, after choking until tears came to his eyes, felt blindly for the chair from which he had risen to wish Mr. Kinney an indistinct good-night. His hand found the arm of the chair; he collapsed feebly, and sat uttering incoherent sounds.

      “Papa!”

      “It brings things back so!” he managed to explain, “This very Fred Kinney's father and young George's father, Wilbur Minafer, used to do just such things when they were at that age—and, for that matter, so did George Amberson and I, and all the rest of us!” And, in spite of his exhaustion, he began to imitate: “Don't you try to put me in the light of a boor!” “I shall take pleasure in calling at some time when a more courteous sort of people—” He was unable to go on.

      There is a mirth for every age, and Lucy failed to comprehend her father's, but tolerated it a little ruefully.

      “Papa, I think they were shocking. Weren't they awful!”

      “Just—just boys!” he moaned, wiping his eyes. But Lucy could not smile at all; she was beginning to look indignant. “I can forgive that poor Fred Kinney,” she said. “He's just blundering—but George—oh, George behaved outrageously!”

      “It's a difficult age,” her father observed, his calmness somewhat restored. “Girls don't seem to have to pass through it quite as boys do, or their savoir faire is instinctive—or something!” And he gave away to a return of his convulsion.

      She came and sat upon the arm of his chair. “Papa, why should George behave like that?”

      “He's sensitive.”

      “Rather! But why is he? He does anything he likes to, without any regard for what people think. Then why should he mind so furiously when the least little thing reflects upon him, or on anything or anybody connected with him?”

      Eugene patted her hand. “That's one of the greatest puzzles of human vanity, dear; and I don't pretend to know the answer. In all my life, the most arrogant people that I've known have been the most sensitive. The people who have done the most in contempt of other people's opinion, and who consider themselves the highest above it, have been the most furious if it went against them. Arrogant and domineering people can't stand the least, lightest, faintest breath of criticism. It just kills them.”

      “Papa, do you think George is arrogant and domineering?”

      “Oh, he's still only a boy,” said Eugene consolingly. “There's plenty of fine stuff in him—can't help but be, because he's Isabel Amberson's son.”

      Lucy stroked his hair, which was still almost as dark as her own. “You liked her pretty well once, I guess, papa.”

      “I do still,” he said quietly.

      “She's lovely—lovely! Papa—” she paused, then continued—“I wonder sometimes—”

      “What?”

      “I wonder just how she happened to marry Mr. Minafer.”

      “Oh, Minafer's all right,” said Eugene. “He's a quiet sort of man, but he's a good man and a kind man. He always was, and those things count.”

      “But in a way—well, I've heard people say there wasn't anything to him at all except business and saving money. Miss Fanny Minafer herself told me that everything George and his mother have of their own—that is, just to spend as they like—she says it has always come from Major Amberson.”

      “Thrift, Horatio!” said Eugene lightly. “Thrift's an inheritance, and a common enough one here. The people who settled the country had to save, so making and saving were taught as virtues, and the people, to the third generation, haven't found out that making and saving are only means to an end. Minafer doesn't believe in money being spent. He believes God made it to be invested and saved.”

      “But George isn't saving. He's reckless, and even if he is arrogant and conceited and bad-tempered, he's awfully generous.”

      “Oh, he's an Amberson,” said her father. “The Ambersons aren't saving. They're too much the other way, most of them.”

      “I don't think I should have called George bad-tempered,” Lucy said thoughtfully. “No. I don't think he is.”

      “Only when he's cross about something?” Morgan suggested, with a semblance of sympathetic gravity.

      “Yes,” she said brightly, not perceiving that his intention was humorous. “All the rest of the time he's really very amiable. Of course, he's much more a perfect child, the whole time, than he realizes! He certainly behaved awfully to-night.” She jumped up, her indignation returning. “He did, indeed, and it won't do to encourage him in it. I think he'll find me pretty cool—for a week or so!”

      Whereupon her father suffered a renewal of his attack of uproarious laughter.

      Chapter XI

      In the matter of coolness, George met Lucy upon her own predetermined ground; in fact, he was there first, and, at their next encounter, proved loftier and more formal than she did. Their estrangement lasted three weeks, and then disappeared without any preliminary treaty: it had worn itself out, and they forgot it.

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