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all my heart and that I hoped our house would be a place for
him to come and find some comfort in of an evening and
that I hoped and thought I could be a better daughter to
him there than at home. Then I mentioned Peepy’s coming
to stay with me, and then Pa began to cry again and said the
children were Indians.’
‘Indians, Caddy?’
‘Yes,’ said Caddy, ‘wild Indians. And Pa said’—here she
began to sob, poor girl, not at all like the happiest girl in the
world— ‘that he was sensible the best thing that could hap-
pen to them was their being all tomahawked together.’
Ada suggested that it was comfortable to know that Mr.
Jellyby did not mean these destructive sentiments.
‘No, of course I know Pa wouldn’t like his family to be
weltering in their blood,’ said Caddy, ‘but he means that
they are very unfortunate in being Ma’s children and that
he is very unfortunate in being Ma’s husband; and I am sure
that’s true, though it seems unnatural to say so.’
I asked Caddy if Mrs. Jellyby knew that her wedding-day
was fixed.
‘Oh! You know what Ma is, Esther,’ she returned. ‘It’s im-
possible to say whether she knows it or not. She has been
told it often enough; and when she IS told it, she only gives
me a placid look, as if I was I don’t know what—a steeple in
the distance,’ said Caddy with a sudden idea; ‘and then she
shakes her head and says ‘Oh, Caddy, Caddy, what a tease
you are!’ and goes on with the Borrioboola letters.’
‘And about your wardrobe, Caddy?’ said I. For she was
under no restraint with us.

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