“Could you? Then I couldn’t. I’m a weaker vessel than you, and your strength must give way to my weakness.”
“I know I’ve no right to tax you, if you really care about it.”
Frederic F. Frew made no answer to this in words, but pursued her in her retreat from the sofa on which they had sat.
“Don’t, Fred. I am so much in earnest! I wish I knew what I ought to do to throw in my two mites.”
“Not throw me over, certainly, and break all the promises you have made for the last twelve months. You can’t be in earnest. It’s out of the question, you know.”
“Oh! I am in earnest.”
“I never heard of such a thing in my life. What good would it do? It wouldn’t bring the cotton in. It wouldn’t feed the poor. It wouldn’t keep your aunt’s boiler hot.”
“No; that it wouldn’t,” said Mrs. Granger, starting up; “and coals are such a terrible price.”
Then she went to sleep again and ordered in large supplies in her dreams.
“But I should have done as much as the widow did. Indeed I should, Fred. Oh, dear! to have to give you up! But I only meant for a year.”