"There don't seem to be any special need of making up my mind in this case," said Eben, still looking at the water. "It seems to be made up for me. It is perfectly plain—to me at least—that it is my duty to go to work and earn my own living, and when you see your duty, do it. That is my notion. The more you go squirming about trying to get rid of it, the harder it will come at last."
"I know it, and yet, oh, Eben, I can't bear it!" exclaimed Flora, passionately. "I did so want to have you go to college, and it all seemed so plain, and now—Can't we manage it somehow? Or don't you really care, after all? Sometimes I think you don't, you are so cool about it."
"Flossy!" said Eben.
"Well, there! I am a wretch, I know," said Flora, penitently. "I know you do care, and you are giving it all up for us."
"I would give—no, not my right hand, but sometimes I think I would give my right foot to follow out father's plan and go to college," said Eben. "Ever since I first came here, when I was a little fellow seven years old, I have heard father talk about my having a good education, and I made up my mind three years ago just what I wanted to do. I meant to be a doctor, like Doctor Henry over at the Springs. But now, Flossy, just let us look the thing squarely in the face."
"Well, if you like, though I don't know what good it will do. I have looked at it till I am sick."
"It isn't as bad as it might be," said Eben. "We have a roof over our heads, a good garden, and a cow, besides our little capital in money. Then you have your machine, which you have learned to run nicely, and you seem likely to have plenty of work, so that when your machine is once paid for, all you make will be clear gain. All that is very nice, and then we all have our health, which is better still. But then there is the other side. We cannot three of us live on the interest of a thousand dollars, and what comes out of the garden and your machine. We can't live on it, let alone any notion of saving money for college expenses."
"You would not have to go to college for two or three years," argued Flora. "Your schooling would not cost much, and matters might come round in three years."
"They might, but they wouldn't," said Eben, shrewdly. "Things don't come round, as I see. You have got to move them, and shake them about, and rub off the corners, and make them round. Besides, how should I look or feel—a great stout boy fifteen years old—going to school and living on you and mother? I should be ashamed to look any one in the face. No, no, Flossy, I have got to do my duty, as I said. If I am to have an education, if He sees it's right that I should have one," he added, reverently, "he will bring it about. I have asked him to guide me, and make me decide rightly, and I believe he has done so—I believe I see my way clear."
Flora was silent. Her brother had got on ground where she could not follow him. Presently, however, she said, "You talk just like Alice Brown. I would give anything to feel so, but I can't. However, I do believe you are right, and as you say, if you have made up your mind, the sooner you set about it the better. I know very well, when I think it over, that it will be all I can do to keep myself and mother. She cannot understand any reason why she should not have all she ever had. If only she would not talk so about pa! It makes me feel as if I should go crazy sometimes."