rs from Elizabeth.
It turned him back. Ah, how many a time two hundred dollars would
prevent a tragedy! How many a time financial salvation means also
moral salvation!

It was midsummer before Denasia was strong enough to return to New
York, though she was passionately anxious to do so. "We are so far out
of the right way," she pleaded. "So far! In New York we are nearer
home. In New York I shall get well."

And by this time Roland had fully realised how unfit he was for the
vivid, rapid life of the West. The cultivated, gentlemanly drawl of
his speech was of itself an offence; his slow, unruffled movements and
attitudes, his "ancient" ways of thinking, his conservatism and
gentility and ultra-superficial refinement were the very qualities not
valued and not needed in a community full of new life, ardent,
impulsive, rapid, looking forward, and determined not to look
backward.

So with hopes much dashed and hearts much dismayed they re-entered
New York. The question of the future was a serious one. They were
nearly dollarless again, and even Roland felt that Elizabeth could
not be appealed to for some months at least. Denasia was facing the
sorrowful hopes of motherhood. For three or four months she could not
sing. They restricted themselves to a small back room in a Second
Avenue boarding-house, and Roland searched the agencies and the
papers daily for something suitable to his peculiar characteristics
and capabilities, and found nothing. There was a great city full of
people, but not one of them wanting the services of a young
gentleman like Roland.

As for Denasia, she was still very weak. July and August tried her
severely. Some few little garments had to be made, and this pitiful
sewing was all she could manage. She did not lose her courage,
however, and if anything touched Roland's best feelings at this time,
it was her unfailing hope, her smiling welcome no matter how
frequently he brought disappointment, her brave assurances that she
would be quite well before the winter season, and then all would be
put right.

In the last days of August the baby was born. Denasia recovered
rapidly, but the little lad was a sickly, puny child. He had been
wasted by fever, and fretted by anxious cares and by many fears, even
before they were his birthright. All the more he appealed to his
mother's love, and Denasia began now to comprehend something of the
sin against mother-love which she herself had committed.

Perhaps