Betty laughed teasingly. "My dear Mrs. Ashton, you talk as if you could have avoided that affliction! You could not very well have helped being my mother, could you? You did not deliberately choose me out from a lot of girls. Because if you did, I should have very little respect for your good judgment. Think, if you might have selected either Polly or Esther! Why, then you would be sure to be rich again some day. For one of them would act so marvelously that she would be able to cast laurels at your feet, while the other would sing you back to fortune. But as it is, you will just have to put up with poor me until Dick gets his chance. Now do eat your breakfast while I relate the details of our good luck storm. In the first place, we are not going to have to give up our beloved house. At least not yet, and perhaps never if our German-American Pension plan turns out satisfactorily." Betty drank a swallow of coffee, hardly appreciating what she was doing, so deep was her absorption in their affairs. "Honestly, mother, I should never have dreamed of being so interested in this plan of Rose's and Miss McMurtry's for us, if it had not been for Dick's letters. But if German ladies can keep successful pensions, why not Americans? Remember what a funny lot of people Dick has described--the fat widow with the two musical daughters. I hope one of them won't set her cap for Dick, he loves music so dearly. Then you know the young boy student who was nearly starving when Dick rescued him, and the old Baron who wears a wig, and the half dozen others? But no matter how queer and funny they may be, they can be no more so than our pensioners. There is Miss McMurtry herself and Anthony Graham, and Dr. Barton moving into town to have an office in our old library. I wonder sometimes if he and Rose are still friends. They had a disagreement once out at the cabin and she just speaks to him since." Then Betty Ashton hesitated and devoted herself to finishing her breakfast. "I am sure I don't understand why you fail to mention Herr Crippen, child, who is to have a room here with us and teach his pupils in our big drawing room. I am glad he has been so successful with his music pupils that he is able to give Esther the advantage of studying in New York. I wish you did not have such a ridiculous prejudice against him. Indeed, my dear, I have a very strong reason for insisting that you be kind to him. He is Esther's father and----" Mrs. Ashton spoke more firmly than was usual with her.