"I want to study, pappa. I want to go on with my work. I'll come home summers just the same. I'll come home Christmas if you want me to. It won't cost much, I'll live just as cheap as I can——"
"'Tain't that, 'tain't that, Rose," he said. Then he lifted his head and looked around.
She read his thought and the tears came to her eyes in blinding rush.
"I know, pappa. It's terrible to go now, when you've built this nice home for me, but what can I do? It's so lonesome here! I thought maybe I'd get used to it, but it gets worse. I can't stay here this winter. You must let me go. I'll go crazy if I stay here all winter. I must go out into the world. I want to be an artist. I want to see great people. I can't stay here, pappa John!"
The terrible earnestness of every sentence stabbed John Dutcher's heart like a poniard thrust. He put her away and rose stiffly.
"Well, well, Rosie, if you want to go——"
He did not finish, but turned tremblingly and walked out. She remained on the floor near his chair and watched him go, her soul sick with wretchedness.
Why was the world so ordered? Why must she torture that beautiful, simple soul? Why was it that all her high thoughts, her dreams, her ambitions, her longings, seemed to carry her farther away from him?
She could have beaten her head against the wall in her suffering. She rose at last and crawled slowly to her room, and abandoned herself to black, rayless hopelessness.
John Dutcher went out to the hedgerow and sat down on a stool. Around him bees were humming in the wet clover. The calves thrust their inquiring noses through the fence and called to him. The rain-clouds were breaking up, and the sun was striking under the flying canopy at the West.