"'In them words,' says I to her, 'is some of why women shouldn't do it. The most of 'em reason,' I says, 'like rabbits!'
"Letty sort of straightened up and looked at me, gentle. She just graduated from the Indian Mound School and, in spite of yourself, you notice what she says. 'You're mistaken, Miss Marsh,' says she, 'I believe in women voting because we're folks and mothers, and we can't bring up our children with men taking things away from 'em that we know they'd ought to have. I want to bring up my children by my votes as well as by my prayers,' says she.
"'Your children!' says I.
"I donno if you've ever noticed that look come in a girl's face when she speaks of her children that are going to be sometime? Up to that minute I'd 'a' thought Letty's words was brazen. But when I see how she looked when she said it, I sort of turned my eyes away, kind of half reverent. We didn't speak so when I was a girl. The most we ever heard mentioned like that was when our mothers showed us our first baby dress and told us that was for our baby—and then we always looked away, squeamish.
"'That's kind of nice,' I says, slow, 'your owning up, out loud that way, that maybe you might possibly have—have one, sometime.'
"'My mother has talked to me about it since I began to know—everything,' Letty said.
"That struck awful near home.
"'I always wisht,' I says, 'I'd talked with my mother—like that. I always wisht I'd had her tell me about the night I was born. I think everybody ought to know about that. But I remember when she begun to speak about it, I always kind of shied off. I should think it would of hurt her. But then,' I says, 'I never had any of my own. So it don't matter.'
"'Oh, yes, you have, Miss Marsh,' says Letty.
"I looked at her, blank.