Then she would be of age, and she meant to sell enough of her share of her father's land to finish.

She knew her mother would oppose her bitterly in that, for Mrs.Comstock had clung to every acre and tree that belonged to her husband.

Her land was almost complete forest where her neighbours owned cleared farms, dotted with wells that every hour sucked oil from beneath her holdings, but she was too absorbed in the grief she nursed to know or care.

The Brushwood road and the redredging of the big Limberlost ditch had been more than she could pay from her income, and she had trembled before the wicket as she asked the banker if she had funds to pay it, and wondered why he laughed when he assured her she had.

For Mrs.Comstock had spent no time on compounding interest, and never added the sums she had been depositing through nearly twenty years.