"Well, of course, I don't approve of that store business," replied
Jimmy, deprecatingly, "but I can't help liking pluck when I see it. Look
here, Gabriella, if you're bent on working, why don't you turn in and
teach?"

"Yes, let her teach by all means," agreed Uncle Meriweather, with
genuine enthusiasm for the idea. "I've always regarded teaching as an
occupation that ought to be restricted by law to needy ladies."

"But I can't teach, I don't know enough, and, besides, I'd hate it,"
protested Gabriella.

"I'm sure you might start a school for very little children," said Mrs.
Carr. "You don't have to know much, to teach them, and you write a very
good hand."

"What about plain sewing?" asked Pussy in her ready way. "Couldn't you
learn to make those new waists all the girls are wearing?"

"I haven't the patience to sew well. Look how hard mother works, making
buttonholes with stitches so fine you can hardly see them, and yet she
doesn't get enough to put bread into her mouth, and but for her
relatives she'd have been in the poorhouse long ago. I'm tired of being
on charity just because we are women. Now that Jane has come home for
good I am simply obliged to find something to do."

"I don't mind your wanting to work, dear, I think it's splendid of you,"
returned Pussy, "but I do feel that you ought to work in a ladylike
way--a way that wouldn't interfere with your social position and your
going to germans and having attention from young men and all that."