"Well--what is truth? How is the poor ostrich to find it out? Besides, papa, you are comfortable, and the truths you believe in aren't." Her smile at him was one of the comforts Mr. Merrick most securely counted on. Felicia, in every way, made him comfortable, even when she argued with him, and by half-droll opposition called out his refutations.
"My dear child," he now said, "your logic is truly feminine. I have never shirked an intellectual consequence. If, for the moment, I enjoy certain satisfactions, I never forget that my position is that of the condemned prisoner."
"We certainly have a nicely furnished cell."
"Your mind evades the realities of the bars," said Mr. Merrick, selecting, after a hesitation in the choice, a cake from the plate she handed him. "Once you have seen an ugly fact you turn your back upon it."
"What better thing can one do with an ugly fact? What claim has truth or logic upon anybody in a world of atoms and their concussions? The only thing to do is to make oneself comfortable--with tea or mysticism as the case may be."
Mr. Merrick received this flippancy with calm, convinced of an essential chime under superficial janglings. "You are, I am glad to say, Felicia, a woman who can think."
"We do a lot of thinking," Felicia assented. "How little else!" she could not repress. That her thinking had been for the most part lonely she was glad that her father never suspected, nor did he suspect a Puck-like fun she found in turning his own theories against him. He ate slowly now, his eyes raised in a train of thought that even his intelligent daughter, he felt, could hardly have followed. His own detachment from the shows of life was its theme. Suddenly, however, this contemplation was shaken by a more intimate, more stirring realization. "My dear Felicia," he exclaimed, glancing rapidly at the tea-table and at the stand of eatables, "is not this the day for the frosted cake?"
"Grant forgot it, papa; you shall have it to-morrow."
"It is really very careless of Grant, very careless. She should not have forgotten," said Mr. Merrick, flushed, and as seriously aggrieved as a child. "Pray, speak sharply to her about it. I looked forward to the frosted cake to-day, freshly baked, warm, as I like it. It is very annoying. You are sure that she has not made it?"