"I reckin you kin guess fur yourself whut that old woman done then. She flared up and showed all her teeth. She said that the quality always sent their daughters off to boardin' school to give 'em the final polish that made fine ladies of 'em. She said her Ole Miss--meanin' your grandmother--had gone to Knollwood and that your mother had gone there, and that you two girls were goin' there, too, whether or no. We tried to explain to her that some of the finest young ladies in the land and some of the best-born ones never had the advantages of a college education, but she said she didn't keer whut people somewheres else might do--that the daughters of her kind of quality folks went to college and that you two were goin', so that all through your lives you could hold up your heads with the finest in the land. You never seen anybody so set and determined about a thing ez that old woman was. We tried explainin' to her and we tried arguin' with her, and Lew Lake tried losin' his temper with her, him bein' somewhat hot-headed, but nothin' we could say seemed to have any effect on her at all. She jest set there with her old skinny arms folded on her breast like a major-general, and that old under lip of hers stuck out and her neck bowed, sayin' over and over agin that you girls were goin' to that boardin' school same ez the Dabneys and the Helms had always done. So finally we throwed up our hands and told her we were at the end of our rope and she'd kindly have to show us the way to bring it all about. "And then she up and showed us. You remember the night me and Lew Lake come up to your house to talk over the matter of your college education and I told you to call Aunt Sharley into the conference--you remember that, don't you? And you remember she come out strong in favour of Knollwood and that after a while we seemed to give in? Well, child, I've got a little confession to make to you now along with a bigger one later on: That was all a little piece of by-play that had been planned out in advance. We knowed beforehand that Aunt Sharley was goin' to favour Knollwood and that we were goin' to fall into line with her notions about it at the end. She'd already licked us to a standstill there in my office, and we were jest tryin' to save our faces. "So you went to college and you both stayed there two full years. And I mout ez well tell you right now that the principal reason why you had so many purty fixin's to wear whilst you was away and why you had ez much pin money to spend ez any other two girls there was because that old woman lived on less'n it would take, seemin'ly, to keep a bird alive, savin' every cent she could scrape up, and bringin' it to me to be sent on to you ez part of your allowance."