“‘Hasn’t he any little girls of his own?’
“‘No, you poor dear, you don’t know what I mean; what it all means.’
“‘No, tell me, Lannie, for if it is not nice and good I don’t want to do anything but just stay here.’
“‘Well, it’s this, Ailene; may God grant that you will forgive me for disturbing your young heart, but your father came near losing all he had. He applied to a firm for financial aid; the old gentleman who was here furnished the much needed assistance under these conditions: That you be educated at his expense and then he will marry you for he has fallen in love with you.’
“‘Oh, the ugly old thing! I don’t want to marry him. I hate him. I don’t want to marry anybody. I want to stay where you are,’ I cried.
“‘Yes, dear, I know, but a great deal depends on you, for you were not to know it yet, and as I have been a witness to the contract and have been sworn to secrecy you must not tell anyone that you know.’
“‘But I won’t go.’
“‘Yes, pet, you must go and remember that you are only fifteen now; you are not expected to marry your father’s benefactor until you are nineteen or twenty, changes may take place before the time arrives for you to give up all hope.’
“It was a sad leave taking for more than me; I shall never forget the pained expression in my mother’s face and the stern, sad look of my father as I waved my hand from the car window.
“Lannie had carried a little basket of luncheon to the station for me, and when I opened it on the train late that afternoon I found a handful of wild flowers wrapped in a piece of the “Lumberman’s Journal,” which I knew Lannie to be a regular subscriber of; there under the glass cover are those same flowers, withered and faded beyond recognition, but the sweet memory which clings to them makes them more precious to me than all the blossoms this world contains.