If we could only get another girl I
wouldn't care."

She waited for him to speak, and, when he did not do so, asked
hopelessly:

"Don't you think we can get another girl pretty soon if we go a good ways
off from this neighbourhood?"

"I don't know anything about it, and I don't want to hear anything more
about it either," was the ungracious reply.

"I am in the wrong. You will hear no more on either subject."

The tone was earnest. Elizabeth meant what she said. John went from the
house without the customary good-bye kiss. We live and learn, and we learn
most when we get ourselves thoroughly in the wrong.

CHAPTER XIII

"ENNOBLED BY THE REFLECTED STORY OF
ANOTHER'S GOODNESS AND LOVE"

It was on a Saturday, three weeks after Mrs. Hunter's return, that
Elizabeth asked to make her first visit with the baby.

"Aunt Susan was here so much while I was sick, John, that I feel that we
must go to see them to-morrow."

"Oh, my goodness!" John replied, stepping to the cupboard to put away the
pile of plates in his hands. "I'm tired enough to stay at home."

They had just finished washing the supper dishes together, and Elizabeth
considered as she emptied the dishpan and put it away. She had been
refused so often that she rather expected it, and yet she had thought by
the cordiality with which John had always treated Aunt Susan that he would
be reasonable about this visit now that she was able, and the baby old
enough to go out.

Elizabeth was never clear about a difficulty, nor had her defences well in
hand upon the first occasion. With those she loved, and with John in
particular, any offence had to be repeated over and over again before she
could protect herself. She felt her way slowly and tried to preserve her
ideals; she tried to be fair. She could not tell quickly what to do about
a situation; she took a long time to get at her own attitudes and
understand them, and it took her still longer to get at the real
intentions of others. As she brought out her cold-boiled potatoes and
began to peel them for breakfast, she reflected that Aunt Susan had come
as regularly to see them as if she had always been well treated, until
Mrs. Hunter's coming. At that point the visits had dropped off.

"Baby is nearly three months old, and I promised Aunt Susan that I'd take
him to see her the first place I took him. We owe it to her, and I'm not
going to neglect her any more. We can leave a dinner of cold chicken and
p