But she shook her head quickly, determinedly, saying that as I had heard so much I must hear more.

Then she went on with her story.
"I have committed a great fault," said she, "but one not so deep or inexcusable as now appears, whatever that man may say," she added with a slow turn toward the silent secretary.
Did she expect to provoke a reply from the man who, after the first triumphant assertion of his claim, had held himself as removed from her and as unresponsive to her anguish as had he whom she directly addressed?
If so, she must have found her disappointment bitter, for he did not respond with so much as a look.

He may have smiled, but if so, it was not a helpful smile; for she turned away with a shudder and henceforth faced and addressed the mayor only.
"My mother married against the wishes of all her family and they never forgave her.

My father died early--he had never got on in the world--and before I was fifteen I became the sole support of my invalid mother as well as of myself.

We lived in Boone, Minnesota.
"You can imagine what sort of support it was, as I had no special talent, no training and only the opportunity given by a crude western town of two or three hundred inhabitants.