"He doesn't approve of them. He thinks they're ugly and foolish and—and not right. He believes that society is—well, not exactly wrong, but—"
"All the same," declared Mrs. Bates, "he will receive a ticket, and I shall contrive to let him know that there's a place waiting for him."
"Oh, no! No, you mustn't! What would he ever think of me?"
"I shall, too."
"No! Don't—please don't. He wouldn't know what to think. He might think that I—"
"I shall, too!" repeated Mrs. Bates, more loudly and stubbornly. "I shall, too!" She knew that anything less marked than this would be a chilling disappointment to the girl before her. "And if he hasn't got a dress-coat, why, he can just get one. I'm sure if a young man cared anything for me—"
"Oh, don't talk that way—please don't!" implored Jane, half hiding her face with a kind of despairing joy. "Don't say such things, I beg of you!"
"—I should expect him to make some little sacrifice for me," Mrs. Bates completed. "Let him come and look at us; we may not be half so bad as he imagines."
"Sacrifice." What a delightful and comforting sound the word had to Jane.
It vitalized in a moment all her story-reading of the past ten years.
That anybody should ever be moved to make a sacrifice for her!
"But he used to live in the Settlement," persisted Jane; "he used to work there. He doesn't approve of Charity Balls; he thinks that isn't at all the way to do things."