ea. All of these called on the bride, and some of them
invited her to their houses. They were busy women like Pauline herself,
intent in their several ways on their vocations or avocations. They were
disposed to extend the right hand of fellowship to Mrs. Littleton, whom
they without exception regarded as interesting in appearance, but they
had no leisure for immediate intimacy with her. Having been introduced
to her and having scheduled her in their minds as a new and desirable
acquaintance, they went their ways, trusting chiefly to time to renew
the meeting and to supply the evidence as to the stranger's social
value. Busy people in a large city are obliged to argue that new-comers
should win their spurs, and that great minds, valuable opinions, and
moving social graces are never crushed by inhumanity, but are certain
sooner or later to gain recognition. Therefore after being very cordial
and expressing the hope of seeing more of her in the future, every one
departed and left Selma to her duties and her opportunities as
Littleton's wife, without having the courtesy to indicate that they
considered her a superior woman.

Pauline regarded this behavior on the part of her friends as normal, and
having done her social duty in the afternoon tea line, without a
suspicion that Selma was disappointed by the experience, she gave
herself up to the congenial undertaking of becoming intimate with her
sister-in-law. She ascribed Selma's reserve, and cold, serious manner
partly to shyness due to her new surroundings, and partly to the
spiritual rigor of the puritan conscience and point of view. She had
often been told that individuals of this temperament possessed more
depth of character than more emotional and socially facile people, and
she was prepared to woo. In comparison with Wilbur, Pauline was
accustomed to regard herself as a practical and easy-going soul, but she
was essentially a woman of fine and vigorous moral and mental purpose.
Like many of her associates in active life, however, she had become too
occupied with concrete possibilities to be able to give much thought to
her own soul anatomy, and she was glad to look up to her brother's wife
as a spiritual superior and to recognize that the burden lay on herself
to demonstrate her own worthiness to be admitted to close intimacy on
equal terms. Wilbur was to her a creature of light, and she had no doubt
that his wife was of the same ethereal composition.

Pauline was g