about a school at home or abroad, and that is all. Now be good, and
consider which you would like best."

Bessie's tears overflowed. "I hate girls!" she said with an asperity
that quite shamed her mother, "they are so silly." Mr. John Short with
difficulty forbore a smile. "And they don't like me!" she added with
gusty wrath. "I never get on with girls, never! I don't know what to say
to them. And when they find out that I can't speak French or play on the
piano, they will laugh at me." Her own countenance broke into a laugh as
she uttered the prediction, but she laughed with tears still in her
eyes.

The lawyer nodded his head in a satisfied way. "It will all come right
in time," said he. "If you can make fun of the prospect of school, the
reality will not be very terrible to a young lady of your courageous
temper."

Poor Bessie was grave again in an instant. She felt that she had let her
fate slip out of her hands. She could not now declare her refusal to go
to school at all; she could only choose what kind of school she would go
to. "If it must be one or another, let it be French," she said, and
rushed from the room in a tempestuous mood.

Mrs. Carnegie excused her as very affectionate, and as tired and
overdone. She looked tired and overdone herself, and out of spirits as
well. Mr. John Short said a few sympathetic words, and volunteered a few
reasonable pledges for the future, and then took his leave--the kindest
thing he could do, since thus he set the mother at liberty to go and
comfort her child. Her idea of comforting and Bessie's idea of being
comforted consisted, for the nonce, in having a good cry together.