Page:Temple Bailey--The Gay cockade.djvu/401

 through a winter like the last. I can't keep my self-respect if we go on living as we did last winter."

"Haven't you any pride, Anne?"

"I have self-respect."

She left the room a conqueror. After she had gone the three women talked about her. They did not say it openly, but they felt that there was really an ordinary streak in Anne. Otherwise she would not have wanted to work in an office.

There was, however, nothing to be done. Anne was twenty-one. She was to get a hundred dollars a month. In spite of herself, Amy felt a throb of the heart as she thought of what that hundred dollars would mean to them.

Murray Flint was much perturbed when he heard of Anne's decision. He wrote to her that of course she knew that there was no reason why she should go into an office—his home and hearthstone were hers. She wrote back that she should never marry! After that, Murray felt, with Amy and Ethel and Aunt Elizabeth, that there was an ordinary streak in Anne!

When he arrived in August at Aunt Elizabeth's he was astonished at the change in Amy. She looked really very young as she came to meet him, and Aunt Elizabeth's house was a perfect setting for her charms. Murray was very fond of Aunt 395