" Roger looked at his daughter in deep concern. Awkwardly
his heavy hand touched her small plump shoulder, and he felt the constant
quivering there. "Now, now," he muttered, uneasily, "it's going to be all
right, you know--" And at that she gave him a rapid glance out of those
warm hunted eyes, as though to ask, "What do you know of this?" And Roger
flinched and turned to the door.

Bruce was working at his desk, with an old briar pipe in his teeth. He
looked up with a quick nervous smile which showed his dread of the coming
ordeal, but his voice had a carefully casual tone.

"Does she want me now?" he asked.

"No," said Roger. And he told of her plan for the children. "I volunteered
myself," he added, "but she wouldn't hear to it."

"Oh, my God, man, you wouldn't do," said Bruce, in droll disparagement.
"You with forty-nine bottles of pasteurized milk? Suppose you smashed one?
Where'd you be? Moving our family isn't a job; it's a science, and I've got
my degree." He rose and his face softened. "Poor girl, she mustn't worry
like that. I'll run in and tell her I'll do it myself--just to get it off
her mind."

He went to his wife. And when he came back his dark features appeared a
little more drawn.

"Poor devil," thought Roger, "he's scared to death--just as I used to be
myself."

"Pretty tough on a woman, isn't it?" Bruce muttered, smiling constrainedly.

"Did Baird say everything's going well?" Baird was Edith's physician.

"Yes. He was here this afternoon, and he said he'd be back this evening."
Bruce stopped with a queer little scowl of suspense. "I told her I'd see to
the trip with the kiddies, and it seemed to relieve her a lot." His eye
went to a pile of documents that lay on the desk before him. "It'll play
the very devil with business, taking three days off just now. But I guess I
can manage it somehow--"

A muscle began to twitch on his face. He re-lit his pipe with elaborate
care and looked over at Roger confidingly:

"Do you know what's the matter with kids these days? It's the twentieth
century," he said. "It's a disease. It starts in their teeth. No modern
girl can get married unless she has had her teeth straightened for years.
Our dentist's bill, this year alone, was over eight hundred dollars. But
that isn't all. It gets into their young intestines, God bless 'em, and
makes you pasteurize all they eat. It gets into their nerves and tears 'em
up, and your only chance to save 'em is school--not