“Now that is what I call spunk, Elnora!  Downright grit,” said Wesley Sinton.  “Don’t you let them laugh you out.  You’ve helped Margaret and me for years at harvest and busy times, what you’ve earned must amount to quite a sum.  You can get yourself a good many clothes with it.”

“Don’t mention clothes, Uncle Wesley,” sobbed Elnora, “I don’t care now how I look.  If I don’t go back all of them will know it’s because I am so poor I can’t buy my books.”

“Oh, I don’t know as you are so dratted poor,” said Sinton meditatively.  “There are three hundred acres of good land, with fine timber as ever grew on it.”

“It takes all we can earn to pay the tax, and mother wouldn’t cut a tree for her life.”

“Well then, maybe, I’ll be compelled to cut one for her,” suggested Sinton.  “Anyway, stop tearing yourself to pieces and tell me.  If it isn’t clothes, what is it?”

“It’s books and tuition.  Over twenty dollars in all.”

“Humph!  First time I ever knew you to be stumped by twenty dollars, Elnora,” said Sinton, patting her hand.

“It’s the first time you ever knew me to want money,” answered Elnora.  “This is different from anything that ever happened to me.  Oh, how can I get it, Uncle Wesley?”

“Drive to town with me in the morning and I’ll draw it from the bank for you.  I owe you every cent of it.”

“You know you don’t owe me a penny, and I wouldn’t touch one from you, unless I really could earn it.  For anything that’s past I owe you and Aunt Margaret for all the home life and love I’ve ever known.  I know how you work, and I’ll not take your money.”

“Just a loan, Elnora, just a loan for a little while until you can earn it.  You can be proud with all the rest of the world, but there are no secrets between us, are there, Elnora?”

“No,” said Elnora, “there are none.  You and Aunt Margaret have given me all the love there has been in my life.  That is the one reason above all others why you shall not give me charity.  Hand me money because you find me crying for it!  This isn’t the first time this old trail has known tears and heartache.  All of us know that story.  Freckles stuck to what he undertook and won out.  I stick, too.  When Duncan moved away he gave me all Freckles left in the swamp, and as I have inherited his property maybe his luck will come with it.  I won’t touch your money, but I’ll win some way.  First, I’m going home and try mother.  It’s just possible I could find second-hand books, and perhaps all the tuition need not be paid at once.  Maybe they would accept it quarterly.  But oh, Uncle Wesley, you and Aunt Margaret keep on loving me!  I’m so lonely, and no one else cares!”

Wesley Sinton’s jaws met with a click.  He swallowed hard on bitter words and changed what he would have liked to say three times before it became articulate.