yourself to get a first-class position--so that the younger girls can go
to school at all, instead of going out as hired help? Can't you feel the
injustice of being poor, and dirty, and ignorant, when thousands of other
people are just _rotten_ with money?"

"I've heard of such people, but I've never met any of them around here,"
returned his sister quietly. "We're no worse off than lots of people,
better off than some. I think we've got a good deal to be thankful for,
living where we can see green things growing, and being well, and having
a mother like ours. I wish you could come to feel that way. Perhaps you
will some day."

"Why don't you marry Fred's cousin, instead of Fred?" asked her brother,
changing the subject abruptly. "You could get him just as easy as not--I
could see that when he was here last summer. Then you could go to Boston
to live, get something out of life yourself, and help your family, too."

"No one in the family but you would want help from me--at that price,"
returned Sally, still speaking quietly, but betraying by the slight
unevenness of her voice that her quiet spirit was at last disturbed more
than she cared to show. "Why, Austin, you know how I lo--care for Fred,
and that I gave him my word more than two years ago! Besides, I heard you
say yourself, before you knew he fancied me, that Hugh Elliott drank--and
did all sorts of other dreadful things--he wouldn't be considered
respectable in Hamstead."

Austin laughed again. "All right. I won't bring up the subject again. Ten
years from now you may be sorry you wouldn't put up with an occasional
spree, and sacrifice a silly little love-affair, for the sake of
everything else you'd get. But suit yourself. Cook and wash and iron and