Neither the language nor the mood would seem to become the beautiful Mistress of Arts; but each testified to the survival of the humanness of the young woman. In justice to her, however, it must be explained that she had not begun this upsetting of father’s and mother’s and her own cherished plan with impetuous defiances. She had begun gently, with sighs, with remarks about longing for California. She felt so tired; she wished she didn’t have to travel now. If she could just go back and walk under the palms and orange trees in dear old Los Angeles; if she could get one great big bite of San Francisco fog, and see a little desert and a mountain or two, before starting out for this junky old Europe, she would be reconciled. Otherwise, she would not be reconciled. Of course, she would go,—since they had planned it for so long, and since mamma’s heart was set upon it;—but she would go unreconciled. Reconciled! Mrs. Mitchell knew perfectly well what reconciled meant, but she did not know just what Bessie meant by dinging on that word. After fifteen minutes it appeared that Bessie was through with hints. She had begun to boldly propose, and then earnestly to plead, and finally tearfully to demand that the European trip be postponed two weeks. "But my child! The trip is all planned. The passages are paid for, everything is ready," protested Mrs. Mitchell. "But what’s the good of being the slave of your plans? You don’t have to do a thing you don’t want to just because you’ve planned." Bessie’s lip was full and ripe when she pouted and her voice was freighted heavily with protest and appeal. How pretty her eyelids were when there was a tear quivering on the lashes like a ball of quicksilver. And how really enchanting she looked, as with hair a bit disheveled and color heightening, she went on to argue impetuously: "What’s the good of having a private car? What’s the good of being a vice-president’s wife and daughter, if you can’t change your mind and go galloping out to California when you feel like it? Back to your own home! Back to your own people! Back where the scenery is the grandest in the world! Back where the sky is high enough that you don’t have to shoulder the zenith out of the way in the morning so that you can stand up straight and take a full breath." "Bessie Mitchell!" exclaimed her mother at this juncture, turning on her offspring accusingly. "What has got into you? Something has! You’re up to something. What is it?" Bessie brooked her mother’s discerning glance and then dodged it, very much as if that lady had hurled at her the silver-backed hair brush she held in her hand. "Why," she exclaimed with an air of injured innocence; "nothing has got into me. I was just taking one last look at the California papers, and it made me homesick."