a brick red, either from constant exposure to the
sun or from drinking, probably both. He seemed morose, as if he were
consciously ignoring the presence of his "boss," and worked steadily on,
once even failing to answer Adelle when she spoke, apparently
unconscious of her presence behind him. Adelle liked especially to watch
the masons at work. Their clever management of the great stones they had
to handle, the precise yet easy way in which they lined and chipped and
trigged and mortared, fitting all the detail of their rough mosaic, gave
her a pleasant sense of accomplishment such as she had felt in her own
efforts with metal and stone. It stirred an instinct for manual labor
which was not far down in her character, and actually made her own
shapely hands twitch to be at the fascinating work. And the masons' work
grew so surely, course upon course, and when done seemed so solid, so
eternal!... This morning she lingered longer than usual watching the
young mason wield his hammer and trowel. Archie had ruffled her badly
with his talk about money losses, and now she felt soothed, freed from
stupid perplexities. The mason's large hands, she noted, were supple and
dexterous--he made no useless movements. Occasionally he turned his head
to spit tobacco or drew off to look at his wall, but these were the only
interruptions in his rhythmic motions. He paid no attention whatever to
the woman behind him.

Adelle was prettily dressed in a costume of white linen with a cloud of
chiffon tied about her small hat and a parasol that she had purchased
this summer in Paris, which consisted of an enormous gold lace
butterfly. She was fuller in figure than before her child had come and
in perfect health, though still pale. Fresh and well cared for, she was
if not beautiful very attractive and dainty--all that money could make
of her human person. Adelle was not given to prolonged reflection of any
sort, but probably she could not help comparing her own dainty, cool,
exquisitely clean person with this sweaty, sun-burned, coarse laborer in
his black cotton shirt, frayed khaki trousers, and shoes that the lime
had burned all color from. She must have felt a complacent sense of
physical superiority to the man who was working for her, and perhaps
congratulated herself that her lot in the universe had come out such a
comfortable one.

The mason rolled up a large stone and prepared to set it home in the
bottom course. Adelle observed that he w