"Aha, you go from world to world. Rose, you will do whatever you dream of—provided you don't marry." He said this as lightly as he could, but she knew he meant it.
"There isn't much danger of that," she said, trying to laugh.
"Well, no, perhaps not." They fell into a walk, and moved slowly just outside the throng of dancers.
"Now, mark you, I don't advise you at all. I have realized from the first a fatality in you. No one can advise you. You must test all things for yourself. You are alone; advice cannot reach you nor influence you except as it appeals to your own reason. To most women marriage is the end of ambition, to you it may be an incentive. If you are big enough, you will succeed in spite of being wife and mother. I believe in you. Can't you come and see me tomorrow? I want to give you letters to some Chicago people."
The company began to disperse, and the sadness impending fell upon them all. One by one good-byes were said, and the dancers one and all slipped silently away into the night.
CHAPTER XIII
THE WOMAN'S PART
It was all over at last, the good-byes, the tearful embraces, the cheery waving of hands, and Rose was off for home. There were other students on the train, but they were young students whom she did not know. At the moment it seemed as if she were leaving all that was worth while—five years of the most beautiful time of her life lay behind her.
She had gone there a country girl, scared and awkward. She was now a woman (it seemed to her) and the time for action of some sort had come. She did not look to marriage as a safe harbor. Neither had she regarded it as an end of all individual effort, as many of her companions unequivocally had done.