“I guess you are, too. If you feel that way why did you tell her to come with me in the first place?”
“I told her to come because I knew she ought to, for her own sake.”
“Yes, and I’m sending her to Boston to study music for the same reason. If you think I’m sending her off, making myself a darned sight lonesomer than I was before, because I want to get her out of your way you’re flattering yourself.”
“Then whose way are you getting her out of?... Well, well, never mind! I think it’s a fine opportunity for Esther. She ought to go, and I shall tell her she must. That is what you came here to ask me to do, of course.”
He was having his own way once more and his good humor returned.
“That is settled then,” he said. “I’m much obliged to you, Reliance. You can generally be counted on to see a light—after you’ve had the fun of arguing that there isn’t any to see. You and I will have to keep each other company while the girl’s away. When I get too lonesome I shall be dropping in here to pick a fight with you. There will always be one waiting to be picked, I can see that. You and Millard better come up to dinner again next Sunday. Esther likes to have you.”
That evening he told his niece of the great plan. He was prepared for objections but there were none worth mentioning. Esther was too dazzled by the brilliant picture and its possibilities to remember that it meant leaving her new home and Harniss and her Aunt Reliance. Her uncle dwelt upon the future and its marvelous promise of a career.
“If what all hands say about your voice is true,” he declared, “you can climb high, Esther. We’ll start you there at the Conservatory and, when you’ve learned all they can teach you, we’ll go somewhere else where you can learn more. I understand that Paris is the place where they teach the top-notchers. All right; I’ve never been to Paris. I’ve been to Havre and Marseilles and those ports, of course, but Paris was a little too expensive a side trip for a second mate. We’ll go there together, two or three years from now—oh, yes, we will! And maybe some other places before then—on your summer vacations, you know. I haven’t been to San Francisco since I was twenty-two. We’ll go out there—maybe next summer—just to get me used to cruising again. What do you say to that?”
She was too overcome to say much. And during the remainder of the week he took pains to keep new pictures constantly before her eyes. On Sunday, when, after dinner, she bade farewell to her aunt, there was a temporary let down in her high spirits, but Reliance refused to consider the parting in the least a serious matter.
“Why, you’ll be here every Saturday and Sunday, dearie,” she said. “And all summer. You and I will see each other almost as often as we do now. Don’t let your Uncle Foster see you cryin’. Goodness knows there is nothin’ to cry about!”