Full resolution (JPEG) - On this page / på denna sida - Part IV - II
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258 THE CONFESSION OF A FOOL
privileges usually enjoyed by the firstborn. Because 1
would not extend the same privileges to the younger one,
who had no idea of handling an expensive book, I was
accused of injustice.
"There ought to be no difference whatever," she said.
"No difference? Not even in the quantity of clothes
and shoes?
"
There was no direct reply to my remark, but a con-
temptuous " fool " made up for the omission.
" Every one according to merit and ability ! This for
the elder, that for the younger one!
"
But she refused to understand my meaning, and stub-
bornly maintained that I was an unjust father, and
"hated " iny younger daughter.
To tell the truth, I was more attached to the elder one,
because she awakened in me memories of the first beautiful
days of my life, and because, also, she was sensible in
advance of her years ; I may also have been influenced by
the fact that the younger one was born at a time when I
had grave doul^ts of my wife’s fidelity.
The mother’s "justice,’" I may say, evidenced itself
in complete indifference to the children. She was always
either out or asleep. She was a stranger to them, and
they became devoted to me ; their preference for me was
so marked that it roused her jealousy, and in order to
conciliate her, I made a practice of letting her distribute
the toys and sweets which I bought for them, hoping that
in this way she might win their affection.
The little ones were a very important factor in my life,
and in my darkest moments, when I Avas almost broken by
my isolation, contact with them bound me afresh to life
and their mother. For the sake of the children the
thought of divorcing my wife was unthinkable ; an ominous
fact, as far as I was concerned, for I was becoming more
and more her abject slave.
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