more than a
moment at a time--even though the tragedy were her own--were
incomprehensible to Janet.

"Get on to this," Lise adjured her. "When I first was acquainted with him
he handed me a fairy tale that he was taking five thousand a year from
Humphrey and Gillmount, he was going into the firm. He had me
razzle-dazzled. He's some hypnotizes as a salesman, too, they say.
Nothing was too good for me; I saw myself with a house on the avenue
shopping in a limousine. Well, he blew up, but I can't help liking him."

"Liking him!" cried Janet passionately. "I'd kill him that's what I'd
do."

Lise regarded her with unwilling admiration.

"That's where you and me is different," she declared. "I wish I was like
that, but I ain't. And where would I come in? Now you're wise why I can't
go back to Hampton. Even if I was stuck on the burg and cryin' my eyes
out for the Bagatelle I couldn't go back."

"What are you going to do?" Janet demanded.

"Well," said Lise, "he's come across--I'll say that for him. Maybe it's
because he's scared, but he's stuck on me, too. When you dropped in I was
just going down town to get a pair of patent leathers, these are all wore
out," she explained, twisting her foot, "they ain't fit for Boston. And I
thought of lookin' at blouses--there's a sale on I was reading about in
the paper. Say, it's great to be on easy street, to be able to stay in
bed until you're good and ready to get up and go shopping, to gaze at the
girls behind the counter and ask the price of things. I'm going to
Walling's and give the salesladies the ha-ha--that's what I'm going to
do."

"But--?" Janet found words inadequate.

Lise understood her.

"Oh, I'm due at the doctor's this afternoon."

"Where?"

"The doctor's. Don't you get me?--it's a private hospital." Lise gave a
slight shudder at the word, but instantly recovered her sang-froid.
"Howard fixed it up yesterday--and they say it ain't very bad if you take
it early."

For a space Janet was too profoundly shocked to reply.

"Lise! That's a crime!" she cried.

"Crime, nothing!" retorted Lise, and immediately became indignant. "Say,
I sometimes wonder how you could have lived all these years without
catching on to a few things! What do you take me for! What'd I do with a
baby?"

What indeed! The thought came like an avalanche, stripping away the
veneer of beauty from the face of the world, revealing the scarred rock
and crushed soil beneath. This was realit