lia pinned on serenely. It was in no code of hers to move out of
hearing.

"The only thing she really bucked at was when she found Miss Page at our
house last night," Ted said. "Mother's no snob--but I wish you could
have seen her face!"

"Was she perfectly awful, Ted?" somebody asked.

"Who, Miss Page? No-o, she wasn't perfectly awful--yes, she was pretty
bad," Theodora admitted. "Wasn't she, Babbie?"

"Oh, well"--Barbara hesitated--"she's--of course she's terribly common.
Just the second-rate actress type, don't you know?"

"Did she call your Mother 'ma'am'?" giggled Enid Hazzard. "Do you
remember when she said 'Yes, ma'am?' And did she say 'eyether,' and
'between you and I' again?" Something was added to this, but Julia did
not catch it. The girls laughed again.

"Listen," said Ted, "this is the richest yet! Last night Sally said to
her, 'Breakfast's at nine, Miss Page; how do you like your bath?' and
she looked at Sally sort of surprised and said, '_I_ don't want a
bath!'"

"Oh, I don't think that's fair, Teddy," Barbara protested; "she's never
had any advantages; it's a class difference, that's all. She's simply
not a lady; she never will be. You'd be the same in her place."

"Oh, I would not! I wouldn't mark my eyebrows and I wouldn't wear such
dirty clothes, and I wouldn't try to look twenty-five--" Ted began.

Again there was a quick commentary that Julia missed, and another laugh.
Then Barbara said:

"Poor kid! And she looked so sweet in some of Sally's things."

Julia, still bent over her ruffle, did not move a muscle from the
instant she first heard her name until now, when the girls dismissed the
subject with a laugh. She felt as if the house were falling about her,
as if every word were a smashing blow at her very soul. She felt sick
and dizzy, cold and suddenly weak.

She walked across the room to the door, and stood there with her hand on
the knob, and said in a whisper: "Now, what shall I do? What shall I
do?"

At first she thought she would hide, then that she would run away. Then
she knew what she must do: she opened the dressing-room door, and walked
unchallenged through the big auditorium. Groups of chattering people
were scattered about it; somebody was banging the piano; nobody paid the
least attention to Julia as she went down the stairs, and started to
walk to the Toland house.

She was not thinking now. She only wanted to get away.

Nobody stopped her. The house was deserted.