ers of dress. Elizabeth Farnshaw knew that both John Hunter and his
mother were critical upon those accomplishments and her pride told her to
prepare for the mother's inspection. She knew that she was considered a
country girl by those of superior advantages, and she was resolved to show
what could be done in a year in the way of improvement; then she would
come home and teach for money with which to buy her wedding outfit, and
then they would be married. Two years and the certainty of graduation
would have suited her better, but two years was a long time. The picture
of John without her, and the home he was building for her, planted
themselves in the foreground of her thoughts, and Elizabeth was unselfish.
She would not make John Hunter wait. She would make that one year at
Topeka equal to two in the intensity of its living. She would remain away
the shortest possible length of time which was required for her
preparation. Elizabeth was glad that John had his mother to keep house for
him, because she did not want him to be lonesome while she was gone,
though she did not doubt that he would come to Topeka many times while she
was there. Her mind flew off in another direction at that, and she planned
to send him word when there were good lectures to attend.

"John likes those things," she thought, and was filled with a new joy at
the prospect of their books, and lectures, and intellectual pursuits. Her
plan of teaching in the high school was abandoned. It was better to be
loved and have a home with John Hunter than to live in Topeka. The more
Elizabeth thought of it the more she was convinced that her plan was
complete. She was glad there was a month to spare before Mrs. Hunter came.
John's mother was the only warning finger on Elizabeth's horizon. She had
always been conscious of a note of anxiety in John Hunter's voice and
manner whenever he spoke of his mother coming to Kansas to live, and she
found the anxiety had been transferred to her own mind when she began to
consider her advent into the home John was building. She had gathered,
more from his manner than anything definitely said, that his mother would
not approve of much that she would be obliged to meet in the society about
them, that she was a social arbiter in a class of women superior to these
simple farmers' wives, and that her whole life and thought were of a
different and more desirable sort. When Elizabeth thought of Mrs. Hunter
she unconsciously glanced do