they're a pretty mercenary lot," said Nancy, stolidly.

"Not at all. People sometimes have a proper sense of the eternal
fitness of things," her mother returned, with withering inconsistency.
"Not, of course," she added, hastily, "that I would _consent_ to your
marrying Mr. Thornton if you didn't _care_ for him."

Nancy's face was a study.

"I think too much of _him_ for that." Mrs. Warren threw her head back
proudly.

"He's a trifle unideal, mother; a bit different, you must admit,"
Nancy laughed. "To begin with, he has a regular bay window."

"Don't be vulgar, Anne," her mother said, sharply. "He inherits
flesh."

"Yes, I remember once hearing dad say that old Sid Thornton looked
exactly like an inflated bullfrog," Nancy laughed, wickedly.

"Your dear father had an unfortunate way of expressing himself." Mrs.
Warren drew herself up stiffly. "And I must say, my dear, that you are
much more like poor, dear Charles than you are like me." Mrs. Warren
wiped away a tear, and Nancy wondered vaguely whether the tear was for
her late and not too loudly lamented father or for the absence of
_her_ likeness to his relict.

The next moment Nancy, swiftly penitent, was at her mother's side,
and, taking the still wonderfully young face between her hands, said
softly: "Kiss me, Marmee. I'm a brute, I know I am. I know what an
awful struggle it has been to keep up appearances. I--I'm sick of it
all, too. Only--only, I must think, that's all. I must be perfectly
sure--that I really _care_--for Mr. Thornton. Don't say anything more
now, dearie," she pleaded, as her mother started to make some reply.
"I'm going off to think." And, kissing her mother tenderly, this
strange little creature of varying moods and tenses went up to her own
room to have it out with herself. It was the one place where Nancy
Warren felt that she could be perfectly honest with her own soul,
where all shams and insincerities could safely be laid aside without
fear of that arch-tyrant of a small town, Mrs. Grundy.

She opened her window, and, sitting down on the floor in front of it,
her head on the broad sill, gazed, with curiously mingled emotions, at
the imposing pile of gray stone on the hill, where Mr. James Thornton
lived and moved and had his being.

Down deep in her heart of hearts, Nancy Warren knew that she was far
more like her mother than that very lovely and very conventional woman
dreamed.

She was a luxury-loving soul--things that were m