You will understand presently why I do not." She looked down, pulling idly at the thrums along her beaded leggins.
"I told you I was near your age--twenty.

But I do not really know how old I am, I guess that I am twenty--thereabouts." "You look sixteen; not more--except the haunting sorrow----" "I can remember full that length of time....

I must be twenty, Euan.
When I was perhaps seven years old--or thereabout--I went to school--first in Schenectady to a Mistress Lydon; where were a dozen children near my age.

And pretty Mistress Lydon taught us A--B--C and manners--and nothing else that I remember now.

Then for a long while I was at home--which meant a hundred different lodgings--for we were ever moving on from place to place, where his employment led him, from one house to another, staying at one tavern only while his task remained unfinished, then to the road again, north, south, west, or east, wherever his fancy sped before to beckon him....