A look of real pain crossed Amos’ face.  He got up hastily and went to Lydia’s side.

“Why, my little girl, I thought you were perfectly happy this year.  And your clothes look nice to me.”  He smoothed Lydia’s bright hair with his work-scarred hand.  “I tell you, I’ll borrow some money, by heck, and get you some clothes!”

Lydia raised a startled face.  “No!  No!  I’d rather go in rags than borrow money.  We’re almost out of debt now and we’ll stay out.  Don’t borrow, Daddy,” her voice rising hysterically.  “Don’t borrow!” Adam began to howl.

“All right, dearie, all right!” said Amos.

“I’m an old fool to have said anything,” groaned Lizzie.  “What does it matter when she’s the best scholar in her class and everybody, teachers and boys and girls alike, loves her.”

Lydia wiped her eyes and hugged her father, then Adam and then Lizzie.

“I’ve got John Levine, anyhow,” she said.

“You certainly have, hand and foot,” said Amos.

The matter was not mentioned again directly.  But the little scene rankled with Amos.  A week or so later he said at supper, “Lydia, I’m thinking seriously of moving.”

“Moving!  Where?  Why?” exclaimed Lydia.

“Well, I can borrow enough money, I find, to add to the rent we’re paying, to rent the old stone house next to Miss Towne’s.  My idea is to move there just till you finish college!  Then we’ll go out on a farm.  But it’ll give you your chance, Lydia.”

“Land!” murmured Lizzie.

Lydia hesitated.  To move into the house next the Townes would be to arrive, to enter the inner circle, to cease to be a dowd.  But—­she looked about the familiar rooms.

“Daddy,” she said, “would you really want to leave this cottage?”

“I’d just as soon,” replied Amos.  “Most places are alike to me since your mother’s death.  I could stand doing without the garden, if I had the farm to look forward to.”

“How’d we pay the money back?” asked Lydia.

“After the Levine bill passes,” said Amos, “I’ll have a section of pines.”

Instantly Lydia’s sleeping land hunger woke and with it the memory of Charlie’s tales.  She sat in deep thought.

“Daddy,” she said, finally, “we’re not going to borrow, and we’re not going to move again.  I don’t see why people want to keep moving all the time.  I love this place, if it is only a cottage, and I’m going to stay here.  I wish we could buy it and hand it down in the family so’s it would be known forever as the Dudley place.  Then nobody’d ever forget our name.  What’s the use of trying to make a splurge with borrowed money?  We thought it was awful when the Barkers mortgaged their house to buy an automobile.”

“All right,” said Amos, reluctantly.  “But remember, you’ve had your chance and don’t feel abused about our poverty.”

“I won’t,” replied Lydia, obediently.