"All right, then," burst out Sylvia angrily, "go to your old ball. You
seem to think you are an authority on everything. I'm sure I don't want
to go, anyway, and dance with a lot of awkward farmers who smell of the
cow-stable. I shouldn't think you would care about it either, now that
you've had a chance to see things properly done."

"I care a good deal about my sister, Sylvia, and about my friends here,
too. There are no better people on the face of the earth--I've heard you
say so, yourself! It's only a chance that I'm a little less awkward than
some of the others."

The result of this conversation was that Austin did not go near Sylvia
for several days. He was deeply hurt, but that was not all. He began to
wonder, even more than he ever had before, whether his comparative
poverty, his lack of education, his farmer family and traditions and
friends, were not very real barriers between himself and a girl like
Sylvia. What was more, he questioned whether a strong, passionate,
determined man, who felt that he knew his own best course and proposed to
take it, could ever make such a delicate, self-willed little creature
happy, even if there were no other obstacles in their path than those of
warring disposition.

Something of his old sullenness of manner returned, and his mother,
after worrying in silence over him for a time finally asked him what the
trouble was. At first he denied that there was anything, next stubbornly
refused to tell her what it was, and at last, like a hurt schoolboy,
blurted out his grievance. To his amazement and grief, Mrs. Gray took
Sylvia's part. This was the last straw. He jerked himself away from her,
and went out, slamming the front door after him. It was evening, and he
was tired and hot and dirty. The rest of the family had almost finished