'She thinks it's the best place,' Dora rejoined, with the dim smile that always charmed our young man.
'The best place for what?'
'Well, to learn French.' The girl continued to smile.
'Do you mean for her? She'll never learn it; she can't.'
'No; for us. And other things.'
'You know it already. And you know other things,' said Raymond.
'She wants us to know them better—better than any girls know them.'
'I don't know what things you mean,' exclaimed the young man, rather impatiently.
'Well, we shall see,' Dora returned, laughing.
He said nothing for a minute, at the end of which he resumed: 'I hope you won't be offended if I say that it seems curious your mother should have such aspirations—such Napoleonic plans. I mean being just a quiet little lady from California, who has never seen any of the kind of thing that she has in her head.'