nd when she called at the
Burtons' to get a book, as usual, Mrs. Burton said, "Nelie, you're not
feeling very well, are you? Somehow you looked fagged."

"Well, I do feel queer," said the girl. "I seem to be in a kind of
dream. It--scares me. I'm afraid I'm going to be sick."

"Oh, I guess not," Mrs. Burton answered comfortably. "You're just tired
out. How did you like your school?"

"I hated it," said the girl, with a trembling chin and wet eyes. "I
don't believe I'm fit for teaching. I won't try it any more; I'll stay
at home and help mother."

"You ought to keep up your drawing," said Mrs. Burton in general
admonition. "Do you draw any now?"

"Nothing much," said the girl.

"I should think you would, to please your mother. Don't you care
anything for it yourself?"

"Yes; but I haven't the courage I had when I thought I knew it all. I
don't think I should ever amount to anything. It would be a waste of
time."

"I don't think so," said Mrs. Burton. "I believe you could be a great
artist."

The girl laughed. "What ever became of that painter who visited you
year before last at fair time?"

"Mr. Ludlow? Oh, he's in New York. _He_ thought your sketches were
splendid, Nelie."

"He said the girls half-killed themselves there studying art."

"Did he?" demanded Mrs. Burton with a note of wrath in her voice.

"Mm. He told mother so that day."

"He had no business to say such a thing before you. Was that what
discouraged you?"

"Oh, I don't know. I got discouraged. Of course, I should like to
please mother. How much do you suppose it would cost a person to live
in New York? I don't mean take a room and board yourself; I shouldn't
like to do that; but everything included."

"I don't know, indeed, Nelie. Jim always kept the accounts when we were
there, and we stayed at the Fifth Avenue Hotel."

"Do you suppose it would be twice as much as it is here? Five dollars a
week?"

"Yes, I'm afraid it would," Mrs. Burton admitted.

"I've got sixty-five dollars from my school. I suppose it would keep me
three months in New York, if I was careful. But I'm not going to throw
it away on any such wild scheme as that. I know _that_ much."

They talked away from the question, and then talked back to it several
times, after they had both seemed to abandon it. At last Mrs. Burton
said, "Why don't you let me write to Mr. Ludlow, Nelie, and ask him all
about it?"

The girl jumped to her feet in a fright. "If you do, Mrs.