"You don't seem to catch the import of my suggestion clearly, Belle-Ann," admonished Miss Worth. "Your kind father is not in a position to afford you the kind of training and education that your energy and latent talents warrant. At the rate of your present progress, you will soon outstrip the advantages which a school like this can offer you. In less than another year, you will know all that we have here. I well know that you are not the girl to grow vain--but your voice has always stirred me like a miracle. I should accuse my own conscience if your voice went amiss for want of culture. You plainly possess musical instincts that are suffering now. We think that you should go, very shortly now, down to Lexington to the Seminary, where the facilities for your musical training are sufficiently good for the beginning--and eventually you can go abroad--to Germany--and the means will be forthcoming!" "You mean--mean across the ocean?" cried Belle-Ann in amazement. "Yes." "Alone--by myself?" she ejaculated. "Well, we can't tell--I may go with you," predicted Miss Worth with an amused smile. As the import of Miss Worth's proposition filtered into her comprehension, an efflux of joy and gratitude bubbled up from the girl's heart and tinged her dimples with carmine and overspread her cheeks. She sat for a minute beyond words. Her eyes strayed to the open window, and her gaze continued on over the pine tops, as though fixed intently upon a tiny mote that had bobbed about and gesticulated on the horizon of her child-dreams, but which was now resolved out of mythical vagueness into a poignant reality that was growing and speeding toward her with her own humble life for a goal, and with a pageantry of opportunity that dazzled and overwhelmed her senses. Slowly, very slowly, she turned her flushed face and fixed her eyes, now moist and brimming with love, gratitude and homage upon Miss Worth. Her bosom lifted as she looked mutely into the face that smiled down upon her. Then Belle-Ann's round chin lowered and her curls were on the woman's breast and her arms crept up and around and locked about the neck of her benefactress. Miss Worth patted her shoulder, and whispered words through her curls, and presently Belle-Ann whispered back to her. "But can I be worth it--could I ever--ever--be worth it? Besides, I could never, never, pay you-all back," she deplored tremulously. "Surely you can, sometime--you will have money of your own--that is, you may become a great prima-donna," she ended optimistically. Belle-Ann sat up straight. "Prima-donna," she repeated uncertainly.