When father had that typhoid and could not sleep—­dear father! in his normal condition he sleeps like a bag of corn-meal—­who was there in all the house to keep those boys quiet?  Nobody but me.  When they organized a military company in our back yard directly under father’s windows—­two drums, a fish-horn, a jews-harp, a fife, and three tin pans—­was there anybody but me to put a stop to it?  It was on this occasion that the pet name Moolymaria, afterward corrupted into Messymaria, and finally evolved into Meddlymaria, became attached to me.  To this day I do not like to think how many cries I had over it.  Then when Charles Edward got into debt and nobody dared to tell father; and when Billy had the measles and there wasn’t a throat in the house to read to him four hours a day except my unpopular throat; and when Charles Edward had that quarrel over a girl with a squash-colored dress and cerise hair-ribbons; or when Alice fell in love with an automobile, the chauffeur being incidentally thrown in, and took to riding around the country with him—­who put a stop to it?  Who was the only person in the family that could put a stop to it?

Then again—­but what’s the use?  My very temperament I can see now (I didn’t see it when I lived at home) is in itself an unpopular one in a family like ours.  I forecast, I foresee, I provide, I plan—­it is my “natur’ to.”  I can’t go sprawling through life.  I must know where I am to set my foot.  Dear mother has no more sense of anxiety than a rice pudding, and father is as cool as one of his own ice-pitchers.  We all know what Charles Edward is, and I didn’t count grandmother and Aunt Elizabeth.

There has been my blunder.  I ought to have counted Aunt Elizabeth.  I ought to have fathomed her.  It never occurred to me that she was deep enough to drop a plummet in.  I, the burden-bearer, the caretaker, the worrier; I, who am opprobriously called “the manager” in this family—­I have failed them at this critical point in their household history.  I did not foresee, I did not forecast, I did not worry, I did not manage.  It did not occur to me to manage after we had got Peggy safely graduated and engaged, and now this dreadful thing has gaped beneath us like the fissures at San Francisco or Kingston, and poor little Peggy has tumbled into it.  A teacupful of “management” might have prevented it; an ounce of worry would have saved it all.  I lacked that teacupful; I missed that ounce.  The veriest popular optimist could have done no worse.  I am smothered with my own stupidity.  I have borne this humiliating condition of things as long as I can.  I propose to go over to that house and take the helm in this emergency.  I don’t care whether I am popular or unpopular for it.  But something has got to be done for Peggy, and I am going to do it.