rt of a
home! Anna had beautiful times there; she remembered it all, and Aunt
May and Mama nearly spoiled her!"

"You couldn't spoil her," Barbara said affectionately. "She is really
the dearest and most precious! Are you going to let La Franz paint her?"

"No." Julia's motherly pride showed only in a sudden brightness in her
blue eyes. "And I hope no one will tell her that he asked! Even at ten,
Bab, they are quite sufficiently aware of admiration. She had on a sort
of greeny-yallery velvet gown the day we met him, and really she was
quite toothsome, if you ask an unprejudiced observer. But Jim and I were
wondering if it's wise to make her _quite_ so picturesque!"

"You can't help it," Barbara said. "She's just as lovely in a Holland
pinny, or a nightie, or a bathing suit! I declare she was too lovely on
the sands last year, with her straw-coloured hair, and a straw-coloured
hat, and her pink cheeks matching a pink apron! She's going to be
prettier than you are, Ju!"

"Well, at that she won't set the Thames afire!" Julia smiled.

"I don't know! You ought to be an absolutely happy woman, Julie."

Julia settled the baby's head more comfortably against her arm, and
raised earnest eyes.

"Is any one, Bab? Are you?"

"Well, yes, I think I am!" Lady Curriel said thoughtfully. "Of course
those months before Francis's uncle died were awfully hard on us all,
and then before Mary came I was wretched; but now--there's really
nothing, except that we do _not_ live within our income when we're in the
town house, and that frets Francis a good deal. Of course I try to
economize in summer, and we catch up, but it's an ever-present worry!
And then our Geordie's throat, you know, and being so far from Mother
and Rich and the girls, of course! But those things really don't count,
Ju. And in the main I'm absolutely happy and satisfied. I'm pleased with
the way my life has gone!"

"Pleased is mild," Julia agreed. "I'd be an utter ingrate to be anything
but pleased, looking back. Jim is exceptional, of course, and Anna and
this young person seem to me pretty nice in their little ways! And when
we went home this year it was really pleasant and touching, I thought;
all San Francisco was gracious; we could have had five times as long a
visit and not worn our welcome out!"

"So much for having been presented," laughed Barbara.

"Well, I suppose so. Mama was wild with interest about it; she has my
photograph, in the gown I wore to th