"Is it an abounding and arrogant delight in power which makes it appeal to me, or is it something better? To feel that every man on the land, every woman, every child knew one, counted on one's honour and friendship, turned to one believingly in time of stress, to know that one could help and be a finely faithful thing, the very knowledge of it would give one vigour and warm blood in the veins.I wish I had been born to it, I wish the first sounds falling on my newborn ears had been the clanging of the peal from an old Norman church tower, calling out to me, `Welcome; newcomer of our house, long life among us! Welcome!' Still, though the first sounds that greeted me were probably the rattling of a Fifth Avenue stage, I have brought them SOMETHING, and who knows whether I could have brought it from without the range of that prosaic, but cheerful, rattle."The rest of the letter was detail of a business-like order.
A large envelope contained the detail-notes of things to be done, notes concerning roofs, windows, flooring, park fences, gardens, greenhouses, tool houses, potting sheds, garden walls, gates, woodwork, masonry.Sharp little sketches, such as Buttle had seen, notes concerning Buttle, Fox, Tread, Kedgers, and less accomplished workmen; concerning wages of day labourers, hours, capabilities.Buttle, if he had chanced to see them, would have broken into a light perspiration at the idea of a young woman having compiled the documents.He had never heard of the first Reuben Vanderpoel.
Her father's reply to Betty was as long as her own to him, and gave her keen pleasure by its support, both of sympathetic interest and practical advice.He left none of her points unnoted, and dealt with each of them as she had most hoped and indeed had felt she knew he would.This was his final summing up:
"If you had been a boy, and I own I am glad you were not --a man wants a daughter--I should have been quite willing to allow you your flutter on Wall Street, or your try at anything you felt you would like to handle.It would have interested me to look on and see what you were made of, what you wanted, and how you set about trying to get it.It's a new kind of deal you have undertaken.It's more romantic than Wall Street, but I think I do see what you see in it.Even apart from Rosy and the boy, it would interest me to see what you would do with it.This is your `flutter.' I like the way you face it.If you were a son instead of a daughter, I should see I might have confidence in you.I could not confide to Wall Street what I will tell you--which is that in the midst of the drive and swirl and tumult of my life here, I like what you see in the thing, I like your idea of the lord of the land, who should love the land and the souls born on it, and be the friend and strength of them and give the best and get it back in fair exchange.There's a steadiness in the thought of such a life among one's kind which has attractions for a man who has spent years in a maelstrom, snatching at what whirls among the eddies of it.Your notes and sketches and summing up of probable costs did us both credit--I say `both' because your business education is the result of our long talks and journeyings together.You began to train for this when you began going to visit mines and railroads with me at twelve years old.
I leave the whole thing in your hands, my girl, I leave Rosy in your hands, and in leaving Rosy to you, you know how I am trusting you with your mother.Your letters to her tell her only what is good for her.She is beginning to look happier and younger already, and is looking forward to the day when Rosy and the boy will come home to visit us, and when we shall go in state to Stornham Court.God bless her, she is made up of affection and simple trust, and that makes it easy to keep things from her.She has never been ill-treated, and she knows I love her, so when I tell her that things are coming right, she never doubts me.
"While you are rebuilding the place you will rebuild Rosy so that the sight of her may not be a pain when her mother sees her again, which is what she is living for."
