Her eyes flashed for a second and I could tell she was in deadly earnest over it. But she soon laughed and became happy once more. "Rita,--would you like to be able to talk English,--proper English,--just as it should be talked? Would you care to learn English Grammar?" I asked, changing the subject partly. She came close to me on the veranda steps with a jump. "Say that over again, George. I want to get it right," she said plaintively. "Would you like me to teach you English Grammar, Rita?" I repeated. "Would I? Oh! wouldn't I just!" She looked away quickly. "You wouldn't waste your time teachin' the likes of me." "I have been through college. I know something of English Grammar and English Literature. It would be the pleasure of my life to be permitted to impart some of what I know to you." "Oh!--but it would take years, and years, and--then some," she put in. "Not a bit of it! It would take an hour or two of an evening, maybe twice a week. That is all,--provided you went over and learned in between times all that was given you to master." "Gee! I could do that. You just try me." "Well, Rita. Here is your first lesson. "Never say 'gee.' It is not good English." And I never heard Rita use the expression again. I had expected to see her smile with happiness, but she was too tremendously in earnest about it. Determination was written all over her sweet little face. "George,--I'll learn anything you tell me. I'll work hard and I'll learn terrible fast, for I know I ain't no good now at talking slick." "Here is another for you, Rita. Never say 'ain't no good.' Say, 'I am not any good.' 'Ain't' is not a word; it does not appear in any standard dictionary of English. "Well, little girl,--if your grand-dad is agreeable and will permit you to come over now and again of an evening, we can make a start as soon as I get the book I require from Vancouver. "I would come over to your place, but it is quite a distance from the store and I do not like to be too long away, especially in the evenings; for I have seen Chinese in their fishing boats around, and strange launches keep coming into the Bay to anchor overnights. It does not do, you know, to neglect another man's property and goods when the other man pays me for looking after them." "Oh! grand-dad won't mind me coming. He lets me do pretty near anything. Besides, somebody's got to come over to the store now we're getting our groceries from you instead of ordering them from Vancouver." I was not so sanguine as Rita was, especially after what Joe had probably said to Andrew Clark regarding me. "Well!" I concluded, "that will be my excuse when I come over with the medicine for your grand-dad's chronic complaint,--dumbness. So, don't say a word about it until I get over." The Rev. William Auld ran in early that afternoon. He was all excitement.