"As I was saying," Miss Lambkin continued, "that Doctor Sanderson had better be looking out if he wants Sally Ladue. Maybe he don't, but I notice that Eugene Spencer's fluttering around her again and Everett's doing more'n flutter.
"It seems queer to think of Everett as anything but what he has been for some years. He isn't much in favor with some of the older men. I heard that Cap'n Forsyth said that he wouldn't trust him with a slush-bucket. And that pup of a brother of Sally's is copying after Everett as well as he can. He's going to college in a couple of weeks and there's no telling what he'll be up to there. I'm glad I don't have the running of him. Everett's no pattern to cut _my_ goods to."
"No," agreed Mrs. Upjohn soberly. "I can't think what has come over Sally. I never thought she would be dazzled, though I won't deny that Everett can be attractive."
"Come to that," snapped Miss Lambkin, "Everett's handsome and rich and, as you say, he knows how to be attractive. Anyway, there's a plenty that would be only too glad to have a chance at him. Now, if you were of a suitable age, Alicia, you'd snap him up quick enough if you had the chance, and you know it."
Mrs. Upjohn only murmured an unintelligible protest, but her color rose. She would have snapped him up, and she knew it. Letty Lambkin was really getting to be unbearable.
Charlie Ladue was a bright boy and a handsome boy, and he had good enough manners. His attempts at seeming bored and uninterested only amused certain intelligent persons in Cambridge, to whom he had introductions, and attracted them. He was very young and rather distinguished looking and these were the hallmarks of youth; of youth which wishes to be thought of an experience prehistoric; of youth which dreads nothing else so much as to appear young. He would get over these faults quickly; and these intelligent persons laughed quietly to themselves and continued to ask him to their houses--for a time. But the faults rather grew upon him than lessened, so that he became a nuisance and seemed likely to become worse, and they quietly dropped him, before he was half through his freshman year.
His faults were his own, of course. Faults always are one's own when all is said and done, and they usually come home to roost; but that they had developed to such an extent was largely due to Patty's indulgence and over-fondness. She was to blame, but not wholly. It is hard to fix the blame, even supposing that it would help the matter to fix it. When they came to Whitby, Sally was too young to oppose Miss Patty, and for four years Charlie had no mother; much longer, indeed. The circumstances may have been Charlie's undoing, but it is a little difficult to see why the circumstances did not do the same for Sally, and she was not undone yet. No, I am forced to the conclusion, that, in Charlie's case, circumstances could not be held responsible for anything more than hurrying things up a little.