something else," his mother added. "Evidently there must
be something else."

"No!" insisted the nurse.

"But I say yes!"

"Well, I'm afraid the air of Paris might not be good for me."

"You had better wait and try it."

"I would rather go back at once to my home."

"Come, now," cried Madame Dupont, "tell us why?"

"I have told you. I have thought it over."

"Thought what over?"

"Well, I have thought."

"Oh," cried the mother, "what a stupid reply! 'I have thought it over! I
have thought it over!' Thought WHAT over, I want to know!"

"Well, everything."

"Don't you know how to tell us what?"

"I tell you, everything."

"Why," exclaimed Madame Dupont, "you are an imbecile!"

George stepped between his mother and the nurse. "Let me talk to her,"
he said.

The woman came back to her old formula: "I know that we're only poor
country people."

"Listen to me, nurse," said the young man. "Only a little while ago you
were afraid that we would send you away. You were satisfied with the
wages which my mother had fixed. In addition to those wages we had
promised you a good sum when you returned to your home. Now you tell
us that you want to go away. You see? All at once. There must be some
reason; let us understand it. There must certainly be a reason. Has
anybody done anything to you?"

"No, sir," said the woman, dropping her eyes.

"Well, then?"

"I have thought it over."

George burst out, "Don't go on repeating always the same thing--'I have
thought it over!' That's not telling us anything." Controlling himself,
he added, gently, "Come, tell me why you want to go away?"

There was a silence. "Well?" he demanded.

"I tell you, I have thought--"

George exclaimed in despair, "It's as if one were talking to a block of
wood!"

His mother took up the conversation again. "You must realize, you have
not the right to go away."

The woman answered, "I WANT to go."

"But I will not let you leave us."

"No," interrupted George angrily, "let her go; we cannot fasten her
here."

"Very well, then," cried the exasperated mother, "since you want to go,
go! But I have certainly the right to say to you that you are as stupid
as the animals on your farm!"

"I don't say that I am not," answered the woman.

"I will not pay you the month which has just begun, and you will pay
your railroad fare for yourself."

The other drew back with a look of anger. "Oho!" she cried. "We'll see
about that!"

"Yes,