"And you are contented to work at the Union Stock Yards?"
"No, I don't say that; but it's a stepping-stone to better things,
don't you see? It's a living for me for the present, and perhaps by and
by I'll sell some of my poems and stories, and then I'll be able to
leave the yards."
He turned sharply in his seat, and I felt him staring at me.
"When on earth do you get _time_ to write, if you work all day from
nine till five-thirty?"
"Sometimes I get up very early," I said, "at five or six, and then I
write a bit; and unless the girls bother me at night, I have a chance
then, too, though I wish the lights didn't go out at ten."
"But you will kill yourself working in that way."
"No, I won't," I declared eagerly. "I'm awfully strong, and, then,
writing isn't work, don't you see? It's a real pleasure, after what
I've had to do all day, really it is, a sort of balm almost."
"But you can't keep that up. I don't want you to. I want you to go to
school, to begin all over again. If you can, you must forget these
days. I want you to blot them out from your mind altogether."
I thought of that question he had asked me on the train when I had
read to him my poem: "Wouldn't you like to go to school?" Now, indeed,
neither my pride nor my vanity was piqued. I could even smile at his
tone of authority. He was so sure I would obey him; but I was not going
to let him do anything in the world for me unless he could say to me
what I was able to say to him.
"Well?" after a moment he prompted me.
"No, Mr. Hamilton," I said, "I am not going to school. I cannot afford
to."
"I will send you," he said.
"You cannot do that if I refuse to go."
"Why should you refuse?" he said.
"Because it would cost you money--dirty money," I said.
"Nonsense!" He said that angrily now. "I _want_ you to go."
"Thank you; but, nevertheless, I am not going."
He sat up stiffly, and I could feel his frown upon me. He shot out his
words at me as if he wished each one to hit me hard:
"You are an ignorant, untrained, undisciplined girl. If you wish to
accomplish the big things you plan, you will have to be educated. Here
is your chance."
"I'm sorry, but I'll have to get along the best way I can."
"You are stubborn, pig-headed, foolish. Don't you _want_ to be
educated? Are you satisfied with your present illiterate condition?"
"I can't afford to be," I said.
"But if I am willing--"