to love down the resentment, if there was any at all.
And so she could not know the girl a moment too soon.

"Ross, what were you going to do about Arethusa? Did you think of going
down to see her when we got home?"

"I haven't had time to think very much about any of it yet. I had left
her out of things altogether until just this afternoon, by forgetting
about her. Why?"

"Well, then," Elinor's voice trembled slightly, "please let me write
and ask her to come and see us, in Lewisburg. Away from the aunts. So
we can get acquainted by ourselves. And.... And then.... Ross ... if
she likes us, we can keep her with us and make three in the family."

"Does any one wonder," he murmured, apparently to the world at large,
"that I love this woman as much as I do? Elinor, dearest, it is very
plain to me that I am going to be very jealous of my own daughter."

"Do be serious, Ross."

"I am, never was more so in my life."

"You mean.... I may write her to come? You ought to write to her too,"
she was as eager as any girl. "And I shall send her the money for the
trip. It will be my first gift to my new daughter."

"No," said Ross, very decidedly, to the end of this speech, "I can't
let you do that."

And all the eagerness died out of Elinor's face.

"Oh, Ross, now please don't spoil it all by being a mule," she pleaded.
"We have so many of these disagreeable arguments about money, and it is
so very foolish! Why can't I send Arethusa a little check without your
behaving so!"

"Because I won't have you, that's why. Arethusa isn't your incumbrance,
in any way. She's _my_ daughter, and I'm not such a pauper that I
can't manage to support her, for I most certainly did not marry you to
have you caring for my various relatives. You write your letter, and
I'll enclose the check."

"You haven't been treating her very much as if she were your daughter."
The gentle Elinor could not help saying this and saying it quite
sharply.

She so rarely let her temper slip for even the fraction of a moment,
but Ross was always so horrid and obstinate about this question of
money. He never seemed to realize her side of it; that one of the
greatest joys of its possession was what she could do for him and
others that she loved by means of it. To say that she should not have
the very simple pleasure of sending a trifle of her abundance to
Arethusa, was almost too much! The little thought had caused such a
glow when it had come.

"I shall do