mself
waiting with expressionless face till Mrs. Carter murmured:

"The bill, please?"

Tonelessly he said, "Thirty cents."

Mrs. Carter took out, not three, but four dimes--four nice, shiny, new
dimes; she sometimes said at her bank that really she couldn't touch
soiled money. She dropped them on the table-cloth, and went modestly on
her way, an honorable, clever, rather kindly and unhappy woman who had
just committed murder.

Father picked up the ten-cent tip. With loathing he threw it in the
fireplace. Then went, knelt down, and picked it out again. Mother would
need all the money he could get for her in the coming wintry days of
failure--failure he himself had brought upon her.

CHAPTER VIII

Having once admitted hopelessness, it was humanly natural that they
should again hope that they hoped. For perhaps two weeks after the
Carters' visit they pretended that the tea-room was open, and they did
have six or seven customers. But late in September Father got his
courage up, took out the family pen and bottle of ink, the tablet of
ruled stationery and a stamped-envelope, and wrote to Mr. J. Pilkings
that he wanted his shoe-store job back.

When he had mailed the letter he told Mother. She sighed and said, "Yes,
that is better, after all."

An Indian summer of happiness came over them. They were going back to
security. Again Father played the mouth-organ a little, and they talked
of the familiar city places they would see. They would enjoy the
movies--weeks since they had seen a movie! And they would have, Father
chucklingly declared, "a bang-up dinner at Bomberghof Terrace, with
music, and yes, by Jiminy! and cocktails!"

For a week he awaited an answer, waited anxiously, though he kept
reassuring himself that old Pilkings had promised to keep the job open
for him. He received a reply. But it was from Pilkings's son. It
informed him that Pilkings, _pere_, was rather ill, with grippe, and
that until he recovered "no action can be taken regarding your valued
proposition in letter of recent date."

Bewildered, incredulous, Father had a flash of understanding that he,
who felt himself so young and fit, was already discarded.

Mother sat across the kitchen table from him, pretending to read the
_Grimsby Recorder_, but really watching him.

He held his forehead, looked dizzy, and let the letter slip from his
fingers. "I--uh--" he groaned. "I-- Is there anything I can do for you
around the house?"

"T