"And nothing much about her native country. She can't tell the difference between Pilgrims and Puritans. And she didn't know why we came over here, and why it was not the same God in England, and if all the gods in India were idols. Chilian, you shouldn't encourage her irreverence. It looks pert in a child."
"She will get over these ways as she grows older and mingles with other children."
"That is what I am coming to. She ought to begin at once. Betty Upham goes to Dame Wilby. Her mother considers it excellent for small children. She could go with Betty and there would be no fear of her trailing off no one knows where."
Of course, she ought to go to school. He could manage a big boy on the verge of manhood very well. But this woman-child puzzled him. She seemed very tractable, obedient in a certain sense, yet in the end she seemed to get, or to take, her own way. Suppressing one train of action opened another. She had a sweet way of yielding, but a strong way of holding on. A little thing made her happy, yet in her deepest happiness there was much gravity. His theories were that certain qualities brought to pass certain results. He forgot that there were no such things as pure temperaments, and that environments made second nature different from what the first might have been. The child puzzled him by her contrariety, yet she was not a troublesome child.
"Well;" reluctantly.
"I'll see the Dame. And we will start her on Monday."
Elizabeth had another point to gain. She looked over her trunk of pieces. Here were several yards of brown and white gingham, quite enough for a frock without any furbelows. With the roll in her hand she tapped at the partly open door. Rachel had laid out on the bed several white frocks, plain enough even for Salem tastes.
"Cynthia's going to school on Monday," she announced. "And I thought this would make her a good school frock. It won't be dirtysome. You see children here do dress differently. You'll get into the ways."
Rachel looked at the gingham. "I shouldn't like it for her," she said quietly. "Her father always wanted to see her in white. That is new every time it is washed. These things fade and then look so wretched. Beside she will only outgrow these frocks."