e murmured.

"I must go."

"Just a minute. No, don't look at me. Turn your face so that I
can see your profile--so!" She had turned his head with a hand
that gently caressed as it pushed. "I like that view best. Yes,
you are strong and brave. You will succeed! No--I'll not keep
you a minute." She kissed his hand, rested her head for an
instant on his lap as he sat on the edge of the bed, suddenly
flung herself to the far side of the bed, with her face toward
the wall.

"Go to sleep again, lazy!" cried he. "I'll try to be home about
dinner-time. See that you behave today! Good lord, how hard it
is to leave you! Having you makes nothing else seem worth while.
Good-by!"

And he was off. She started to a sitting posture, listened to
the faint sound of his descending footsteps. She darted to the
window, leaned out, watched him until he rounded the corner into
Broadway. Then she dropped down with elbows on the window sill
and hands pressing her cheeks; she stared unseeingly at the
opposite house, at a gilt cage with a canary hopping and
chirping within. And once more she thought all the thoughts that
had filled her mind in the sleepless hours of that night and
morning. Her eyes shifted in color from pure gray to pure
violet--back and forth, as emotion or thought dominated her
mind. She made herself coffee in the French machine, heated the
milk she brought every day from the dairy, drank her _cafe au
lait_ slowly, reading the newspaper advertisements for "help
wanted--female"--a habit she had formed when she first came to
New York and had never altogether dropped. When she finished
her coffee she took the scissors and cut out several of the
demands for help.

She bathed and dressed. She moved through the routine of
life--precisely as we all do, whatever may be in our minds and
hearts. She went out, crossed Long Acre and entered the shop of
a dealer in women's cast-off clothes. She reappeared in the
street presently with a fat, sloppy looking woman in black. She
took her to the rooms, offered for sale her entire wardrobe
except the dress she had on and one other, the simply trimmed
sailor upon her head, the ties on her feet and one pair of boots
and a few small articles. After long haggling the woman made a
final price--ninety-five dollars for things, most of them almost
new, which had cost upwards of seven hundred. Susan accepted the
offer; she knew she could do no better. The woman departed,