with the tablets.
Don't be a fool. Make haste. There! Now I shall be better. Go away--both
of you. Leave me. I'll call when I'm ready."

We stepped over to the window and stood looking out, while behind us the
heroic sufferer, silently and alone, fought a fresh onslaught of pain. I
longed to help her, and she would not let me. I might not even assist
her to her automobile. Ten minutes later on her own feet and with head
held erect she left my room. The only trace of the struggle was a rip
across the back of one of the tight black gloves, caused by desperate
clenching of hands. I had heard the cry of the soft kid as I stood by
the window with Marie.

I opened my work-bag later. The square of fillet lace was there, the
thread and the thimble, the needle threaded just as I had left it when
Breck stepped in and interrupted. There was something else in the bag,
too--something that had not been there before, a white box, long and
thin. It contained the bar of diamonds and pearls, with a note wrapped
around it.

"This pin," the note said, "was not a loan as your returning it
assumes. My other employees received extra checks at Easter-time
when you received this. If you prefer the money, you can, at any
time, receive the pin's value at ----'s, my jewelers, from my
special agent, Mr. Billings. It is my hope that you will make
such use of this portion of your earnings with me that I may be
spared the possibility of the spectacle you afforded me this
afternoon on the Avenue.

"FRANCES ROCKRIDGE SEWALL."

The next night when Esther came in from canvassing, there lay upon her
desk the neglected manuscript of her book, found in a bottom drawer.
Before it stood a chair; beside it a drop-light. A quill pen, brand new,
bright green and very gay, perched atop a fresh bottle of ink. Near-by
appeared a small flat book showing an account between Esther Claff and
Ruth Vars and an uptown bank. Inside, between roseate leaves of thin
blotting paper, appeared a deposit to their credit of five hundred
dollars.

The tide of my fortune had changed. One good thing followed another. It
is always darkest before the storm breaks that clears the sky. My
horizon so lately dim and obscure began to clear. As if five hundred
dollars, safely deposited in a marble-front bank, wasn't enough for one
week to convince me that life had something for me besides misfortune,
three days after Mrs. Sewall called I receive