supper,
and I sat down with a sigh of relief.

Some days are like tin nutmeg-graters that everybody uses to grate you
against, and this was one for me. For an hour I sat and grated my own
self against Alfred's letter that had come in the morning. I realised
that I would just have to come to some sort of decision about what I was
going to do, for he wrote that he was coming in a week or two.

I like him and always have, of that I am sure. He offers me the most
wonderful life in the world, and no woman could help being proud to
accept it. I am lonely, more lonely than I was even willing to confess
to Dr. John. I can't go on living like this any longer. Ruth Clinton has
made me see that if I want Alfred it will be now or never and--quick. I
know now that she loves him, and she ought to have her chance if I don't
want him. The way she idolises and idealises him is a marvel of womanly
stupidity.

Some women like to collect men's hearts and hide them away from other
women on cold storage, and the helpless things can't help themselves.

I have contempt for that sort of a woman, and I love Ruth!

It's my duty to look the matter in the face before I look in
Alfred's--and decide. If not Alfred, what then?

First--no husband. That's out of the question! I'm not strong-minded
enough to crank my own motor-car and study woman's suffrage. I like men,
can't help it, and seem to need one for my own.

Second--if not Alfred, who? Judge Wade is so delightful that I flutter
at the thought, but his mother is Aunt Adeline's own best friend, and
they have ideas in common.

Still, living with him might have adventures. I never saw such eyes!
The girl he wanted to marry died of turberculosis, and he wears a locket
with her in it yet. I'd like to reward him for such faithfulness. But
then Alfred's been faithful too! I look at Ruth Clinton and realise how
faithful, and my heart melts to him in my breast--my brain feels almost
all melted away, too, so I had better keep the heart cold enough to
manage, if I want anything left at all for him to come home to.

In some ways Tom Pollard is the most congenial man I ever knew. I truly
try to make him be serious about the important things in life, like
going to church with his mother and working all day, even if he is rich.
I wish he wasn't so near kin to me! Now, there, I feel in Ruth Clinton's
way again!

I suppose I really would be doing the right thing to marry Mr. Graves,
and I should ador