"I guess there are a good many worse citizens than I am. I wanted to fight for those fellows down in Cuba. And you wouldn't let me do the little I could--help Will to take my place." "After all that happened, Van, we couldn't take it." "And I suppose you don't want to touch anything from me now! See here, May, I came over this morning to do something for you and Will. Did he tell you about my wanting him to go down to my place in the country until he got well and strong?" "He's much interested in this paper, and thinks he can't get away," she said evasively. "Darn his paper! You don't believe Will was cut out to be a thinker? Anyhow, he ought to get his health back first, and give you an easier time, too." "I am all right. Will is very much in earnest about his ideas. You can't get him to think about himself." "Well, I don't mind his trying to reform the earth. If later on he wants a paper to whack the rich with, I'll buy him one. Come, that's fair, isn't it?" May laughed at my offer, but made no reply. "If you folks are so obstinate, if I can't get you to go down to my place, I'll have to turn it into a school or something. A fellow I was talking with on the train the other day gave me an idea of making it into a sort of reform school for boys. What would you think of that? Sarah is taken with the idea--she never liked the place and won't want to go back, now that the baby died there." "That's a good plan--turning philanthropist, Van? That's the right way to get popular approval, Senator." She mocked me, but her laugh rang out good-naturedly. "Popular approval never worried me much. But, May, I want _your_ good-will, and I mean to get it, too." For the more obstinate she was, the more she made me eager to win my point, to bring her and Will back to me. She understood this, and a flash of her old will and malice came into her thin face. She got up to stir the clothes on the fire, and when the water began to run over I stripped off my coat and put my hand to the job. Then I stepped over to the sink. "Do you remember how I used to wash while you wiped, when we wanted to get out buggy-riding, May?" "Yes, and you were an awful shiftless worker, Senator," May retorted, fetching a dish-towel from the rack and beginning to wash, while I wiped. "And you had the same smooth way with you, though in those days you hadn't ten cents to your name. And now, how much is it?" "Oh, say a quarter!" "Then it must have cost you a sight of money to become Senator." "It did some, but I kept back a little." When we had finished the dishes we began on the clothes. A child's dress caught on the wringer and tore. It was marked in a fine embroidery with the initials, J.S. II., for Jaffrey Slocum Harrington--as we had thought to call the little chap. May saw me look at the initials. "Sarah sent it to me along with a lot of baby things when my Jack came. Perhaps she might like to have them back now."