Olive Higgins Prouty

“ Reba obeyed. "There! There!" Aunt Augusta exclaimed, as she ripped the thin page twice in two, "I'll settle that. You write those people that you won't need that room, after all. Understand? And you write 'em to-night, and bring me the answer before you go to bed. You must be crazy, thinking you can go gallivanting off to Boston without a chaperon. Stark crazy!"
Reba's father had stepped noiselessly out of the room. Her mother's cheeks were flushed, and her eyes bright, as usual whenever a little excitement made her forget herself. Aunt Emma, too, had an alert and interested expression. ”

“ Only in defiance lay self-respect. She must prove now the stuff she was made of, or forever after hang her head before her grandfather's proud shaft of granite. It was while her cheeks were still hot with her resolve that Reba wrote to the Women's New England Alliance and told them she would take the room. She ran out and mailed the letter before dinner that noon.
After supper that same night, Aunt Augusta, who had been waiting all day for some sign of surrender from Reba, patience and curiosity tried to the point of exhaustion, inquired briefly, abruptly, "What about that letter?" ”

“ Reba was wary enough to make no inquiries of her father when he came in, and it wasn't until she had begun on her preserved peach, and David, who had been eating swiftly and silently as usual, at his end of the table, had shoved back his chair, preliminary to leaving the room, that the important missive was tossed before her. ”