hitch
up for her if she chose to drive, or if she walked, going without
permission, and was almost as pleased as she. He saw that she had learned
to keep her own counsel and not to speak of her plans till the time for
action had arrived. He felt a something new in her.

Elizabeth had, in fact, learned that while openness was a point of
character, nevertheless, if she dealt openly with her husband it led to
quarrelsome discussions. She saw that John did not know why he opposed
her, that it was instinctive. As she studied him, however, she found how
widely separated they were in spirit. The calm which Jake saw, was all
there, but there were other things fully as vital which had not been there
before. The self-questioning of those months previous to Aunt Susan's
death had been productive of results. While a certain openness of attitude
had disappeared, there was the strength which has all the difference
between deceit and reserve in Elizabeth Hunter's face.

CHAPTER XVIII

THE CHILD OF HER BODY

In the spring Elizabeth's affairs, which had promised to straighten out,
were complicated from a new quarter. She was now to test her strength
against the greatest of all problems for women and to find out if she
could put her precepts into practice. The probability of a second child
had become a certainty; the necessity of adjusting her good-will to
accidental child-bearing was upon her. Often and often her words to
Sadie--"I always wanted my baby"--rose up to accuse her. Only of late had
suspicion become a certainty. Elizabeth did not greet that certainty with
joy. Life was hard; she had more work to do already than she was able to
perform; try as she would she could not get her mental consent. Why must
she have this undesired child? When the thought first wormed its way into
her head, Elizabeth passed from disappointment to self-accusation. By
every law of God and man a mother should want her child; if she did not,
then she stood accused at Nature's bar.

"For its sake I've got to want it; I'll make myself," she decided. But she
did not want it, and found to her growing dismay that she could not make
herself satisfied about it. Instead of becoming reconciled, the question
enlarged and grew and gained in point and force. The girl decided that she
would be glad in spite of every opposing thing, but her resolution was
formed with tears in her heart, if not in her eyes, and the weary ache in
her back never ceased. "It