is a
time of grave concern for everybody intimately connected with the
event. Every girl in the world has performed this ceremony: they have
all been clad in these garments and shoes, and for a day or so all
women, of whatever age, are in love with the little girl making her
first Communion. Perhaps more than anything else it swings the passing
stranger back to the time when she was not a woman but a child with
present gayety and curiosity, and a future all expectation and
adventure. Therefore, the suitable appareling of one's daughter is a
public duty, and every mother endeavors to do the thing that is right,
and live, if only for one day, up to the admiration of her
fellow-creatures.

It was a trial, but an enjoyable one, to Mrs. Cafferty and Mary, this
matching of tan stockings with tan shoes. The shoes were bought, and
then an almost impossible quest began to find stockings which would
exactly go with them. Thousands of boxes were opened, ransacked and
waved aside without the absolute color being discovered. From shop to
shop and from street to street they went, and the quest led them
through Grafton Street en route to a shop where months before Mrs.
Cafferty had seen stockings of a color so nearly approximating to tan
that they almost might be suitable.

As they went past the College and entered the winding street Mary's
heart began to beat. She did not see any of the traffic flowing up and
down, or the jostling, busy foot passengers, nor did she hear the
eager lectures of her companion. Her eyes were straining up the street
towards the crossing. She dared not turn back or give any explanation
to Mrs. Cafferty, and in a few seconds she saw him, gigantic, calm,
adequate, the monarch of his world. His back was turned to her, and
the great sweep of his shoulders, his solid legs, his red neck and
close-cropped, wiry hair were visible to her strangely. She had a
peculiar feeling of acquaintedness and of aloofness, intimate
knowledge and a separation of sharp finality caused her to stare at
him with so intent a curiosity that Mrs. Cafferty noticed it.

"That's a fine man," said she, "he won't have to go about looking for
girls."

As she spoke they passed by the policeman, and Mary knew that when her
eyes left him his gaze almost automatically fell upon her. She was
glad that he could not see her face. She was glad that Mrs. Cafferty
was beside her: had she been alone she would have been tempted to walk
away very qu