“Why, yes!  What makes you ask?”

“Nothing.  But Clementina, sometimes I think you don’t quite understand yourself.  Don’t you know that you are very pretty and very charming?  I’ve told you that often enough!  But shouldn’t you like to be a great success in the world?  Haven’t you ever thought of that?  Don’t you care for society?”

The girl sighed.  “Yes, I think that’s all very nice I did ca’e, one while, there in Florence, last winter!”

“My dear, you don’t know how much you were admired.  I used to tell you, because I saw there was no spoiling you; but I never told you half.  If you had only had the time for it you could have been the greatest sort of success; you were formed for it.  It wasn’t your beauty alone; lots of pretty girls don’t make anything of their beauty; it was your temperament.  You took things easily and naturally, and that’s what the world likes.  It doesn’t like your being afraid of it, and you were not afraid, and you were not bold; you were just right.”  Miss Milray grew more and more exhaustive in her analysis, and enjoyed refining upon it.  “All that you needed was a little hard-heartedness, and that would have come in time; you would have learned how to hold your own, but the chance was snatched from you by that old cat!  I could weep over you when I think how you have been wasted on her, and now you’re actually willing to go back and lose yourself in the woods!”

“I shouldn’t call it being lost, Miss Milray.”

“I don’t mean that, and you must excuse me, my dear.  But surely your people—­your father and mother—­would want to have you get on in the world—­to make a brilliant match—­”

Clementina smiled to think how far such a thing was from their imaginations.  “I don’t believe they would ca’e.  You don’t undastand about them, and I couldn’t make you.  Fatha neva liked the notion of my being with such a rich woman as Mrs. Lander, because it would look as if we wanted her money.”

“I never could have imagined that of you, Clementina!”

“I didn’t think you could,” said the girl gratefully.  “But now, if I left her when she was sick and depended on me, it would look wohse, yet—­as if I did it because she was going to give her money to Mr. Landa’s family.  She wants to do that, and I told her to; I think that would be right; don’t you?”

“It would be right for you, Clementina, if you preferred it—­and—­I should prefer it.  But it wouldn’t be right for her.  She has given you hopes—­she has made promises—­she has talked to everybody.”

“I don’t ca’e for that.  I shouldn’t like to feel beholden to any one, and I think it really belongs to his relations; it was his.”

Miss Milray did not say anything to this.  She asked, “And if you went back, what would you do there?  Labor in the fields, as poor little Belsky advised?”

Clementina laughed.  “No; but I expect you’ll think it’s almost as crazy.  You know how much I like dancing?  Well, I think I could give dancing lessons at the Middlemount.  There are always a good many children, and girls that have not grown up, and I guess I could get pupils enough, as long as the summa lasted; and come winter, I’m not afraid but what I could get them among the young folks at the Center.  I used to teach them before I left home.”