as very weak and scarcely able, as she put it, to draw one leg
after the other. Both the girls would have been surprised to see what a
hearty meal Mrs. Jasher made that evening, when she was up and dressed.
Perhaps she felt that her strength needed keeping up, but she certainly
partook largely of the delicate dinner provided by Jane, who was a most
excellent cook.

After dinner, Mrs. Jasher lay on a pink couch in the pink parlor by a
splendid fire, for the night was cold and raw with a promise of rain.
The widow had a small table at her elbow, on which stood a cup of
coffee and a glass of liquor. The rose-colored curtains were drawn, the
rose-shaded lamps were lighted, and the whole interior of the cottage
looked very comfortable indeed. Mrs. Jasher, in a crocus-yellow tea-gown
trimmed with rich black lace, reclined on her couch like Cleopatra in
her barge. In the pink light she looked very well preserved, although
her face wore an anxious expression. This was due to the fact that the
mail had come in and the three letters brought by the postman had to do
with creditors. Mrs. Jasher was always trying to make both ends meet,
and had a hard struggle to keep her head above water. Certainly, since
she had inherited the money of her brother, the Pekin merchant, she need
not have looked so worried. But she did, and made no disguise of it,
seeing that she was quite alone.

After a time she went to her desk and took out a bundle of bills and
some other letters, also an account book and a bank book. Over these she
pored for quite an hour. The clock struck nine before she looked up from
this unpleasant task, and she found her financial position anything but
satisfactory. With a weary sigh she rose and stared at herself in the
mirror over the fireplace, frowning as she did so.

"Unless I can marry the Professor at once, I don't know what will happen
to me," she mused gloomily. "I have managed very well so far, but things
are coming to a crisis. These devils," she alluded to her creditors,
"will not keep off much longer, and then the crash will come. I shall
have to leave Gartley as poor as when I came, and there will be nothing
left but the old nightmare life of despair and horror. I am getting
older every day, and this is my last chance of getting married. I must
force the Professor to have a speedy marriage. I must! I must!" and
she began to pace the tiny room in a frenzy of terror and well-founded
alarm.

As she was trying