your beauty, and then where are you?" added Charlie, thinking that might daunt the young philanthropist.
But it did not; for Rose answered, with a sudden kindling of the eyes as she remembered her talk with Uncle Alec,—
"I shouldn't like it: but there would be one satisfaction in it; for, when I'd lost my beauty and given away my money, I should know who really cared for me."
Charlie nibbled his pen in silence for a moment, then asked, meekly,—
"Could I respectfully inquire what great reform is to be carried on in the old houses which their amiable owner is repairing?"
"I am merely going to make them comfortable homes for poor but respectable women to live in. There is a class who cannot afford to pay much, yet suffer a great deal from being obliged to stay in noisy, dirty, crowded places like tenement-houses and cheap lodgings. I can help a few of them, and I'm going to try."
"May I humbly ask if these decayed gentlewomen are to inhabit their palatial retreat rent-free?"
"That was my first plan; but uncle showed me that it was wiser not to make genteel paupers of them, but let them pay a small rent and feel independent. I don't want the money of course, and shall use it in keeping the houses tidy, or helping other women in like case," said Rose, entirely ignoring her cousin's covert ridicule.
