traight ahead,
and ignored him. Whether she hurt him as much as she did herself by
the cut direct would be hard to say.

On Saturday evenings and Sunday afternoons ordinarily from two to a
dozen girl friends called her up at the boarding-house, or dropped in
by ones and twos to chat a while, tease her about Jack, or plan some
mild frivolity. Hazel went home, wondering if they, too, would stand
aloof.

When Sunday noon arrived, and the phone had failed to call her once,
and not one of all her friends had dropped in, Hazel twisted her chair
so that she could stare at the image of herself in the mirror.

"You're in a fair way to become a pariah, it seems," she said bitterly.
"What have you done, I wonder, that you've lost your lover, and that
Alice and May and Hortense and all the rest of them keep away from you?
Nothing--not a thing--except that your looks attracted a man, and the
man threw stones when he couldn't have his way. Oh, well, what's the
difference? You've got two good hands, and you're not afraid of work."

She walked out to Granville Park after luncheon, and found a seat on a
shaded bench beside the lake. People passed and repassed--couples,
youngsters, old people, children. It made her lonely beyond measure.
She had never been isolated among her own kind before. She could not
remember a time when she had gone to Granville Park by herself. But
she was learning fast to stand on her own feet.

A group of young people came sauntering along the path. Hazel looked
up as they neared her, chattering to each other. Maud Steele and Bud
Wells, and--why, she knew every one of the party. They were swinging
an empty picnic basket, and laughing at everything and nothing. Hazel
caught her breath as they came abreast, not over ten feet away. The
three young men raised their hats self-consciously.

"Hello, Hazel!" the girl said.

But they passed on. It seemed to Hazel that they quickened their pace
a trifle. It made her grit her teeth in resentful anger. Ten minutes
later she left the park and caught a car home. Once in her room she
broke down.

"Oh, I'll go mad if I stay here and this sort of thing goes on!" she
cried forlornly.

A sudden thought struck her.

"Why _should_ I stay here?" she said aloud. "Why? What's to keep me
here? I can make my living anywhere."

"But, no," she asserted passionately, "I won't run away. That would be
running away, and I haven't anything to be ashamed of. I