hension and shaking with compassion. But pity, with real
men-folks in real life, is perilous stuff to deal in. I was equally
afraid to feel sorry for myself, even though my body chilled with the
sudden suspicion that Casa Grande and all it held might be taken away
from me, that my bairns might be turned out of their warm and
comfortable beds, overnight, that the consoling sense of security
which those years of labor had builded up about us might vanish in a
breath. And I needed new flannelette for the Twins' nighties, and a
reefer for little Dinky-Dunk, and an aluminum double-boiler that
didn't leak for me maun's porritch. There were rafts of things I
needed, rafts and rafts of them. But here we were bust, so far as I
could tell, on the rocks, swamped, stranded and wrecked.

I held myself in, however, even if it _did_ take an effort. I crossed
casually over to the door, and opened it to sniff at the smell of
supper.

"Whatever happens, Dinky-Dunk," I very calmly announced, "we've got to
eat. And if that she-Indian scorches another scone I'll go down there
and scalp her."

My husband got slowly and heavily up out of the chair, which gave out
a squeak or two even when relieved of his weight. I knew by his face
in the half-light that he was going to say that he didn't care to eat.

But, instead of saying that, he stood looking at me, with a tragically
humble sort of contriteness. Then, without quite knowing he was doing
it, he brought his hands together in a sort of clinch, with his face
twisted up in an odd little grimace of revolt, as though he stood
ashamed to let me see that his lip was quivering.

"It's such a rotten deal," he almost moaned, "to you and the kiddies."

"Oh, we'll survive it," I said with a grin that was plainly forced.

"But you don't seem to understand what it means," he protested. His
impatience, I could see, was simply that of a man overtaxed. And I
could afford to make allowance for it.

"I understand that it's almost an hour past supper-time, my Lord, and
that if you don't give me a chance to stoke up I'll bite the edges off
the lamp-shade!"

I was rewarded by just the ghost of a smile, a smile that was much too
wan and sickly to live long.

"All right," announced Dinky-Dunk, "I'll be down in a minute or two."

There was courage in that, I saw, for all the listlessness of the tone
in which it had been uttered. So I went skipping down-stairs and
closed my baby grand and inspected the t