No; Pallas Athene was not an unqualified success—as a grandmother.
There were times, indeed, when her shortcomings nearly drove her granddaughter into considering an elopement with Harry Wilbur, the eighteen-year-old son of Judge Wilbur. With mental apologies to her ideal hero, Val had kept up a vigorous correspondence with Harry, pending the time when the superior suitor should carry her off, and save her the trouble and ungraciousness of breaking the pleasant chains that bade fair, as the days went on, to bind her to her gallant young Hercules. Harry Wilbur was captain of the base-ball team, and the darling hero of the entire New Plymouth Seminary. Most of these studious young ladies thought more of manly strength and of that particular grace that is born of bodily vigor than they did of the qualities of the mind. It was as if, all untutored, they had the improvement of the physique of the race at heart. Julia Otway, for instance, would descant almost daily upon Harry Wilbur's "splendid figure," and how he held his shoulders; how he walked from the hip, and how easily he played the hottest game. She would give as adequate reason for despising some more wealthy or more intellectual citizen, that she hated men who did uninteresting things for a living or did nothing at all. Val shared this spirit of Julia's to an extent that gave her a pleasant sense of victory when young Wilbur showed her more attention at dances and archery tournaments than he showed the other girls. Besides, this open devotion made Ernest Halliwell sad, and Jerry Otway "mad," and that was highly agreeable. But Harry didn't "care a fip," as Jerusha said, about music, and music was the supreme affair of life until—until—
Every year saw the resources of the Ganos lessening, the problem of life more difficult to solve.
"You see," Val would say, radiant, "it just shows the need for me to study singing and make money."
"You? Ridiculous and most improper! No woman of your family has ever dreamed of taking money for anything she has done."
The following summer—or "on June 18," as he would have said, taking care to add the year, and even the hour—John Gano received a shock. A kindly letter had come to him from his old flame, Mrs. Otway, to say that, although he seemed to have forgotten her, still, for old friendship's sake, and out of affection for Val, she felt it a neighborly duty to tell him in confidence that his eldest daughter was making preparations to run away and be a chorus-girl in New York. Mrs. Otway's own daughter had been so oppressed by the enormity of the secret, that she had told her mother. Julia had broken open her bank and given all her savings to "the cause." It was understood, too, that Val had other sources of revenue not revealed. However, merely to deprive her of the money might not be sufficient to head her off, as she had been heard to say she was going to New York, if she had to walk there.
John Gano did not break the awful news to his mother. He betrayed nothing unusual in his aspect, as he said to his daughter:
"It's a glorious afternoon! Shall we go for a walk?"
Val was not as enthusiastic as she had been wont to be, but after the fraction of a moment's preoccupied hesitation she answered, brightly:
"I should love it!"