“Don’t you suppose I’ve thought of that?” he said, frowning.
“I hope you have.”
“Well, I have. When I find enough to do to keep soul and body friendly I’m going to send her to school, if that old ruffian, her father, allows it.”
“I think he will,” I said, gravely; “but after that?”
“After what?”
“After she’s educated and—unhappy?”
“She isn’t any too happy now,” he retorted.
“Granted. But after you have spent all your money on her, what then?”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean that you’ll have no child to deal with, but a woman in full bloom, a woman fairly aquiver with life and intelligence, a high-strung, sensitive, fine-grained creature, whose educated ignorance will not 348 be educated innocence, remember that! And I tell you, Speed, it’s the heaviest responsibility a man can assume.”