her widowhood Martie's heart
knew a deep and passionate relief. Vague and menacing as was the
future, stretching before her, she knew that she would never wish
Wallace back.

BOOK III

CHAPTER I

There were times when Martie found it difficult to believe that she had
ever been away from Monroe at all; evenings, when she and Lydia sat
talking in the shabby sitting room of the old house; or mornings when
she fed the chickens in the soft fog under the willow trees of the
yard. Len and Sally were married and gone, dear Ma was gone, and Belle
had married, too; a tall gaunt woman called Pauline was in her place.

But these things might all have transpired without touching Martie's
own life directly. She might still, in many ways, have been the
dreaming, ambitious, helpless girl of seven years ago. Sometimes the
realization of all she had endured came to her with an odd sense of
shock. She would glance down at her thin hand, in its black cuff, and
fall into deep musing, her face grave and weary. Or she would call
Teddy from his play, and hold his warm little body close, staring at
him with a look that always made the child uneasy. Third Avenue, barred
with sun and shade, in the early summer mornings; Broadway on a snowy
winter afternoon with the theatre crowd streaming up and down, spring
and babies taking possession of the parks--were these all a dream?

No; she had gained something in the hard years; she saw that more and
more. Her very widowhood to Monroe had the stamp of absolute
respectability. Even Pa was changed toward her; or was it that she was
changed toward him? However caused, in their relationship there was a
fundamental change.

Pa had been a figure of power and tyranny seven years ago. Now he
seemed to Martie only an unreasonable, unattractive old man, thwarted
in his old age in everything his heart desired. Lydia was still
tremblingly filial in her attitude toward Pa, but Martie at once
assumed the maternal. She scolded him, listened to him, and dictated to
him, and he liked it. Martie had never loved him as Lydia did; she had
defied and disobeyed and deserted him, yet he transferred his
allegiance to her now, and clung to her helplessly.

He liked to have her walk down to his office beside him in the
mornings, in her plain black. While they walked he pointed out various
pieces of property, and told her how cheaply they had been sold forty
years ago. The whole post-office block had gone for se