Rob laughed again. "I notice the thought entertains most girls," she said. "We have spoken on this tremendous subject also, Hessie. It never occurs to me to make up my mind for good and for all about anything. I have lived only eighteen years, but I have changed my tastes lots of times, for food, for people, for amusements--for lots of things. I don't know how I shall feel at twenty, much more at five and twenty. I'm perfectly happy, and I'm not over the border of little girlhood--I wish I could romp and play dolls without shocking people. And I've had a hard fight, and tasted care and even sorrow, so it seems to be almost wrong to go on twisting and distorting these lovely young days the way you do, Hessie dear. You haven't told me what it is that has set you out this time, however?" "It is something I saw the other day," said Hester sadly. "I wish I could be sunny and light-hearted like you." "The reason of the difference is partly in our temperaments, but it is a good deal because I had to be happy in self-defence from the trials that began early for me," said Rob, with the keen wisdom that underlay her merry ways. "You had your path made smooth; I had to be jolly to keep up myself and the others. If you had worked as I did with a frail, sensitive, beloved father, and had seen your brave mother trying to win a fight where the odds against her were too heavy to count, you'd have learned what virtue lay in a laugh. I don't mean to preach, Hester, but you ought to be satisfied to love and to be loved, and wait your life's meaning cheerfully. But what did you see?" "Father had to go to a tenement district to look over some property there which a client talked of buying," said Hester. "I begged to be taken with him, and, though he objected, saying I was sober enough without seeing misery, he let me have my way--as he usually does, the dear, kind father! I saw, Robin, a cripple boy that was heartrending. I never, never shall forget him, nor get over the feeling that I have no right to my comforts while there is such as he. No; don't interrupt. I know all that reason can tell me on that head, because father talked to me, and he is not merely just--though that's the highest sort of kindness--but he is tenderly kind as well, we both know that. But the feeling remains after I have reasoned and reasoned. Then, after that poor, poor child, I saw others, crippled, maimed, and all incurable. What can be done with them, except leave them in the slums, to be maimed in mind as well as in body?" Hester stopped, her eyes overflowing. Rob put out her hand with a responsive moisture in her own bright eyes. "Dear Hessie, I beg your pardon. I suppose our point of view is different, and very likely I am wrong, and you are right in taking life so hard," she said.