ment, Laura tells me, is 'a mere
experiment' nowadays. They 'experiment' till they feel quite sure--then
notify their parents and get married in a week."

"She is rushing it, I admit," Roger soothingly replied. "But she has her
mind set on Paris in June."

"Paris in June," said Edith, "sums up in three words Laura's whole
conception of marriage. You really ought to talk to her, father. It's your
duty, it seems to me."

"What do you mean?"

"I'd rather not tell you." Edith's glance went sternly to the cradle by her
bed. "Laura pities me," she said, "for having had five children."

"Oh, now, my dear girl!"

"She does, though--she said as much. When she dropped in the other day and
I tried to be sympathetic and give her a little sound advice, she said I
had had the wedding I liked and the kind of married life I liked, and she
was going to have hers. And she made it quite plain that her kind is to
include no children. It's to be simply an effort to find by 'experiment'
whether or not she loves Hal Sloane. If she doesn't--" Edith gave a slight
but emphatic wave of dismissal.

"Do you mean to say Laura told you that?" her father asked with an angry
frown.

"I mean she made me feel it--as plainly as I'm telling it! What I can't
understand," his daughter went on, "is Deborah's attitude in the affair."

"What's the matter with Deborah?" inquired Roger dismally.

"Oh, nothing's the matter with Deborah. She's quite self-sufficient. She at
least can play with modern ideas and keep her head while she's doing it.
But when poor Laura--a mere child with the mind of a chicken--catches
vaguely at such ideas, applies them to her own little self and risks her
whole future happiness, it seems to me perfectly criminal for Deborah not
to interfere! Not even a word of warning!"

"Deborah believes," said her father, "in everyone's leading his own life."

"That's rot," was Edith's curt reply. "Do I lead my own life? Does Bruce?
Do you?"

"No," growled Roger feelingly.

"Do my children?" Edith demanded. "I know Deborah would like them to.
That's her latest and most modern fad, to run a school where every child
shall sit with a rat in its lap or a goat, and do just what he
pleases--follow his natural bent, she says. I hope she won't come up to the
mountains and practice on my children. I should hate to break with
Deborah," Edith ended thoughtfully.

Roger rose and walked the room. The comforting idea entered his mind that
when t