and then if it's a special occasion--"

"But she has such wonderful good times at home; she has everything in
the world now," Julia said wistfully. Miss Toland gave her a shrewd
glance; it was as if she saw Julia for the first time.

"Barbara?" Barbara's aunt poured herself another cup of tea, and fell
into thought for a few moments. Then she set down her cup, straightened
herself suddenly, and burst forth: "Barbara! That's one of the most
absurd things in the world, you know--the supposition that a girl like
Barbara is perfectly happy! Perfectly wretched and discontented, if you
ask me!"

"Oh, no!" Julia protested.

"Oh, yes! Barbara's idle, she's useless, she doesn't know what to do
with herself. No girl of her age does. I know, for my mother brought me
up in the same way. She got a lot of half-baked notions in school; she
had a year of college in which to get a lot more; she came home afraid
to go back to college for fear of missing something at home, afraid of
staying home for fear of missing something at college; compromised on
six months in Europe. Now, here she is, the finished product. We've been
spending twelve years getting Barbara ready for something, and, as a
result, she's ready for nothing! What does she know of the world?
Absolutely nothing! She's never for one instant come in contact with
anything real--she can't. She's been so educated that she wouldn't know
anything real if she saw it! Mind you," said Miss Toland, fixing the
somewhat bewildered Julia with a stern eye, "mind you, I admit it's hard
for people of income to bring a girl up sensibly. 'But,' I've said to my
sister-in-law, 'hand me over one of the younger girls--I'll promise you
that she'll grow up something more than a poor little fashionably
dressed doll, looking sidewise out of her eyes at every man she meets,
to see whether he'll marry her or not!' Of course there's only one
answer to that. I've never married, and I don't know anything about it!"

"Miss Toland will marry," Julia submitted.

"Perhaps she will," her aunt said. "Perhaps, again, she won't. But at
all events, it's a rather flat business, all this rushing about to
dinners and dances; it'll last a few years perhaps--then what? I tell
you what, my dear, there's only one good thing in this world, and that's
_work_--self-expression. It hurts my pride every time I see a nice girl
growing older year after year, idle, expensive, waiting for some man to
miraculously happen along