plenipotentiary looked grave. His own daughters were perfect in those
accomplishments--"Indispensable to the education of a finished
gentlewoman," he said.

Thereupon Bessie, still in excited spirits, delivered her mind with
considerable force and freedom. "It is nonsense to talk of making me a
finished gentlewoman," she added: "I don't care to be anything but a
woman of sense."

Mr. John Short answered her shrewdly: "There is no reason why you should
not be both, Miss Fairfax. A woman of sense considers the fitness of
things. And at Abbotsmead none but gentlewomen are at home."

Bessie colored and was silent. "We have been proposing that you should
go to school for a year or two, dear," said Mrs. Carnegie persuasively.
Tears came into Bessie's eyes. The lawyer's letter had indeed mentioned
school, but she had not anticipated that the cruel suggestion would be
carried out.

"Shall it be an English school or a school in France?" said Mr. Short,
taking the indulgent cue, to avoid offence and stave off resistance. But
his affectation of meekness was more provoking than his sarcasm. Bessie
fired up indignantly at such unworthy treatment.

"You are deciding and settling everything without a word to my father.
How do you know that he will let me go away? I don't want to go," she
said.

"That _is_ settled, Bessie darling. _You have to go_--so don't get angry
about it," said Mrs. Carnegie with firmness. "You may have your choice