go. Why shouldn't I have the same chance as Nancy Ellen?
Please Mother, let me go!"

"You stay right where you are. There is an awful summer's work before
us," said Mrs. Bates.

"There always is," answered Kate. "But now is just my chance while you
have Nancy Ellen here to help you."

"She has some special studying to do, and you very well know that she
has to attend the County Institute, and take the summer course of
training for teachers."

"So do I," said Kate, stubbornly. "You really will not help me,
Mother?"

"I've said my say! Your place is here! Here you stay!" answered her
mother.

"All right," said Kate, "I'll cross you off the docket of my hopes, and
try Father."

"Well, I warn you, you had better not! He has been nagged until his
patience is lost," said Mrs. Bates.

Kate closed her lips and started in search of her father. She found
him leaning on the pig pen watching pigs grow into money, one of his
most favoured occupations. He scowled at her, drawing his huge frame
to full height.

"I don't want to hear a word you have to say," he said. "You are the
youngest, and your place is in the kitchen helping your mother. We
have got the last installment to pay on Hiram's land this summer.
March back to the house and busy yourself with something useful!"

Kate looked at him, from his big-boned, weather-beaten face, to his
heavy shoes, then turned without a word and went back toward the house.
She went around it to the cherry tree and with no preliminaries said to
her sister: "Nancy Ellen, I want you to lend me enough money to fix my
clothes a little and pay my way to Normal this summer. I can pay it
all back this winter. I'll pay every cent with interest, before I
spend any on anything else."

"Why, you must be crazy!" said Nancy Ellen.

"Would I be any crazier than you, when you wanted to go?" asked Kate.

"But you were here to help Mother," said Nancy Ellen.

"And you are here to help her now," persisted Kate.

"But I've got to fix up my clothes for the County Institute," said
Nancy Ellen, "I'll be gone most of the summer."

"I have just as much right to go as you had," said Kate.

"Father and Mother both say you shall not go," answered her sister.

"I suppose there is no use to remind you that I did all in my power to
help you to your chance."

"You did no more than you should have done," said Nancy Ellen.

"And this is no more than you should do for me, in the circumstan