t corner, she said quickly:--

"Mark, did you see where we were when I saw you?"

"At the express office--? Yes," Margaret said, surprised.

"Well, listen," said Rebecca, reddening. "Don't say anything to Mother
about it, will you? She thinks those boys are fresh in there--She
don't like me to go in!"

"Oh, Beck--then you oughtn't!" Margaret protested.

"Well, I wasn't!" Rebecca said uncomfortably. "We went to see if
Maudie's racket had come. You won't--will you, Mark?"

"Tell Mother--no, I won't," Margaret said, with a long sigh. She
looked sideways at Rebecca,--the dainty, fast-forming little
figure, the even ripple and curl of her plaited hair, the assured
pose of the pretty head. Victoria Carr-Boldt, just Rebecca's age,
as a big schoolgirl still, self-conscious and inarticulate, her
well-groomed hair in an unbecoming "club," her well-hung skirts
unbecomingly short. Margaret had half expected to find Rebecca
at the same stage of development.

Rebecca was cheerful now, the promise exacted, and cheerfully
observed:--

"Dad didn't get his raise--isn't that the limit?"

Margaret sighed again, shrugged wearily. They were in their own quiet
side street now, a street lined with ugly, shabby houses and
beautified by magnificent old elms and maples. The Pagets' own
particular gate was weather-peeled, the lawn trampled and bare. A
bulging wire netting door gave on the shabby old hall Margaret knew so
well; she went on into the familiar rooms, acutely conscious, as she
always was for the first hour or two at home, of the bareness and
ugliness everywhere--the old sofa that sagged in the seat, the
scratched rockers, the bookcases overflowing with coverless magazines,
and the old square piano half-buried under loose sheets of music.

Duncan sat on the piano bench--gloomily sawing at a violoncello.
Robert,--nine now, with all his pretty baby roundness gone, a lean
little burned, peeling face, and big teeth missing when he smiled,
stood in the bay window, twisting the already limp net curtains into a
tight rope. Each boy gave Margaret a kiss that seemed curiously to
taste of dust, sunburn, and freckles, before she followed a noise of
hissing and voices to the kitchen to find Mother.

The kitchen, at five o'clock on Saturday afternoon, was in wild
confusion, and insufferably hot. Margaret had a distinct impression
that not a movable article therein was in place, and not an available
inch of tables or chairs unused, befo