exasperation,
crying:

"Oh, what do I care about wheat--about this wretched scrambling for
money. Curtis was busy, you say? He looked that way?"

Page nodded: "Everybody was," she said. Then she hazarded:

"I wouldn't worry, Laura. Of course, a man must give a great deal of
time to his business. I didn't mind when Landry couldn't come home with
me."

"Oh--Landry," murmured Laura.

On the instant Page bridled, her eyes snapping.

"I think that was very uncalled for," she exclaimed, sitting bolt
upright, "and I can tell you this, Laura Jadwin, if you did care a
little more about wheat--about your husband's business--if you had
taken more of an interest in his work, if you had tried to enter more
into his life, and be a help to him--and--and sympathise--and--" Page
caught her breath, a little bewildered at her own vehemence and
audacity. But she had committed herself now; recklessly she plunged on.
"Just think; he may be fighting the battle of his life down there in La
Salle Street, and you don't know anything about it--no, nor want to
know. 'What do you care about wheat,' that's what you said. Well, I
don't care either, just for the wheat itself, but it's Landry's
business, his work; and right or wrong--" Page jumped to her feet, her
fists tight shut, her face scarlet, her head upraised, "right or wrong,
good or bad, I'd put my two hands into the fire to help him."

"What business--" began Laura; but Page was not to be interrupted. "And
if he did leave me alone sometimes," she said; "do you think I would
draw a long face, and think only of my own troubles. I guess he's got
his own troubles too. If my husband had a battle to fight, do you think
I'd mope and pine because he left me at home; no I wouldn't. I'd help
him buckle his sword on, and when he came back to me I wouldn't tell
him how lonesome I'd been, but I'd take care of him and cry over his
wounds, and tell him to be brave--and--and--and I'd help him."

And with the words, Page, the tears in her eyes and the sobs in her
throat, flung out of the room, shutting the door violently behind her.

Laura's first sensation was one of anger only. As always, her younger
sister had presumed again to judge her, had chosen this day of all
others, to annoy her. She gazed an instant at the closed door, then
rose and put her chin in the air. She was right, and Page her husband,
everybody, were wrong. She had been flouted, ignored. She paced the
length of the room a coupl