"She's our girl. I don't see where she'd find better parents."
"I was just thinking—about her education—that a little finishing would help her. We wouldn't always live just as we are living now, and she ought to be prepared for better things. We read about things, but what do we know about them? Grace ought to know."
"I don't really join in your anxiety, Mrs. Rawn," said he largely, "but that'll all come, if it's needful."
"It's needful now. Grace'll be a young woman before long. You see—" she flushed painfully as she spoke—"I don't want to see her grow up awkward. I don't want her to feel as though she hadn't been used to things, you know—to be ashamed of herself and her—her parents. Not that I care so much for myself—"
There were tears in her eyes—tears of reaction, of hope however badly founded. She had toiled long and patiently.
"Why, what's the matter, Laura?" asked her husband.
"I'm getting to be almost old, John—I'm almost an old lady now! I've got gray hairs. I'm forty-five."
He shook her by the shoulders playfully. "Nonsense! We're almost of an age, and I'm just beginning life. Grace is only a child."
"She's eighteen past. That's why I asked you how soon—tell me, have they really raised your salary, John? If we could only have two thousand dollars a year it would be all in the world I should ask."
"Salary!" he guffawed. "Two thousand dollars a year! Say that much a month, a week, a day!"