COMMUTER'S WIFE 63 



for Katrina) were fifteen and seventeen no longer 

 children, but domestic factors. 



Karen had constantly begged Aunt Lot that when 

 Trina was old enough, she should be taken into the 

 household. So as she was now a well-grown girl, 

 Aunt Lot suggested that the time had come, only to 

 be surprised by the reply, " Trina has no mind to be 

 livin'-out girl ; she wish to get ' edication.' " 



Aunt Lot was rather nettled at Karen's tone, but 

 father said education was a worthy desire, that he 

 would talk over the matter with the Schmidts, and see 

 what tastes the girls had, and try to advise them as 

 to the best channel. 



He returned from the interview somewhat per- 

 turbed, finding that Karen's idea of education was 

 purely superficial, being to learn as little as possible 

 of something to get into a store or become a type- 

 writer, anything in short, to escape the stigma of 

 " livin' out," which she in some unaccountable way 

 had come to regard as akin to a crime. While, on 

 talking to the girls, he found that they were of the 

 hopeless, shiftless order, scarcely knowing on which 

 finger to place a thimble, about all they had learned 

 at the local public school being a desire to seem, 

 rather than the industry to be. 



Then a demon entered the family, or perhaps it 



