nd mender besides--and maybe, too,
somebody who can go out and work if they're laid up sick. But
if a girl sees a chance to get on----don't be a fool, Miss
Sackville."

Susan listened with a smile that barely disturbed the stolid
calm of her features. "I'm not going back," she said.

Mary Hinkle was silenced by the quiet finality of her voice.
Studying that delicate face, she felt, behind its pallid
impassiveness, behind the refusal to return, a reason she could
not comprehend. She dimly realized that she would respect it
if she could understand it; for she suspected it had its origin
somewhere in Susan's "refined ladylike nature." She knew that
once in a while among the women she was acquainted with there
did happen one who preferred death in any form of misery to
leading a lax life--and indisputable facts had convinced her
that not always were these women "just stupid ignorant fools."
She herself possessed no such refinement of nerves or of
whatever it was. She had been brought up in a loose family and
in a loose neighborhood. She was in the habit of making all
sorts of pretenses, because that was the custom, while being
candid about such matters was regarded as bad form. She was
not fooled by these pretenses in other girls, though they often
did fool each other. In Susan, she instinctively felt, it was
not pretense. It was something or other else--it was a
dangerous reality. She liked Susan; in her intelligence and
physical charm were the possibilities of getting far up in the
world; it seemed a pity that she was thus handicapped. Still,
perhaps Susan would stumble upon some worth while man who,
attempting to possess her without marriage and failing, would
pay the heavy price. There was always that chance--a small
chance, smaller even than finding by loose living a worth while
man who would marry you because you happened exactly to suit
him--to give him enough only to make him feel that he wanted
more. Still, Susan was unusually attractive, and luck
sometimes did come a poor person's way--sometimes.

"I'm overdue back," said Mary. "You want me to tell 'em that?"

"Yes."

"You'll have hard work finding a job at anything like as much
as ten per. I've got two trades, and I couldn't at either one."

"I don't expect to find it."

"Then what are you going to do?"

"Take what I can get--until I've been made hard enough--or
strong enough--or whatever it is--to stop being a fool."

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