Saturday's Child

her there were hard times, and troubled times, when even a fortnight's irresponsibility and ease was not possible. Yet they

uprooting of ten thousand homes. Young Mrs. Oliver listened to terrible stories, while she distributed second-hand clothing, and filed cards,

g,--she found that her inexperienced hands must deal. She, whose wifehood was all joy and sanity, all sweet and mysterious deepening of the col

e things now," Billy warned h

erson, too. It's no credit to him that he's more fortuna

ce in Mission Street, hoping for a subscription or two in the mail, to fan the dying fires of the "Protest" for a few more days. Better times came; the little shee

-born, she found her problem no longer that of the individual, no longer the question merely of little Martin's crib and care and impending school and college expenses. It was the great burden of the mothers of the world that Susan took upon her shoulders. Why so much strangeness and pain

"he doesn't seem to be breathing. The blanke

en a special miracle, so awed and radiant was Susan's face when she had him in her arms. His goodness, when he was good, seemed to her no more remarkable than his badness, when he was bad. Su

"Mary Jane's Letter" for an approaching issue of the "Protest." The young mother laughed joyfully at Anna's concern, but later, when the trained nurse was gone, and the war

on a night when Susan, flushed and excited, refused his help everyw

say. But with some effort she refrained from answering at all, and felt tears sting her eyes when Billy carried the baby off, t

over the dinner table, "he needs less care every

Billy Junior came laughing into the family group. "How do women DO it!" thoug

f through the very gates of death, a pioneer, merciless and helpless, a little monarch whose kingdom never existed before the day he set up

of terror and despair, while Billy, shivering in his nightgown, had hung at the telephone awaiting her word to call the doctor. Martin's tawny, finely shaped little he

ere blue and grave, Billy's dancing and brown. Martin used words carefully, with a nice sense of values, Billy achieved his purposes with stamping and dimpling, and early coined a tiny vocabulary of his own. Martin slept flat on

bowl for bread-pudding, or running small garments through her machine, while she recited "The Pied Piper" o

just because they're mine?" Susan would ask. And Billy always answered in sober g

yed on, tirelessly devoted to the new mistress, as she had been to the old, and passionately proud of the children. Joe's practice had grown enormously; Joe kept a runabout now, and on Sundays took his well-dressed wife out with him to the park. They had a circle of friends very much like themse

aid wistfully. "Do you think we will ever

ng a day's shopping with a call on mother and babies. Martin, drowsy and contented, was in her arms. Susan, luxuriating in an hour's idleness and gossip, s

his won't last! You'll come out of it some day, dear, a splendid big experienced woman, ready for any big work. And then you'll look back, and think that the da

er all, Aunt Jo, aren't there lots of women who do this sort of thing year in and year out and DON'T achieve anything? As a me

gon, Sue! You have just been telling me that the Lords, for instance, are happier than crowned kings, in their little garden, with a state position assured for Lydia. Then there's Georgi

are, and Georgie's life would drive me to strong

day, about women who have tiny babies to care for, about housekeeping as half the women of the world have to regard it. All that is extremely useful, if you ever want to do anything that touche

ept into her thin cheeks and a tear splashe

of the chance meeting with Doctor Hoffmann in the laboratory that had, in two short minutes, turned the ent

very top of his profession, managed his own small surgical hospital, and maintained one of the prettiest homes in the city. A musician, a humanitarian, rich in his own right, he was

hite clothes. But she forgot everything but pride and pleasure when Betsey, the bride and "Grandma" fell with shrieks of rapture upon the children, and during the whole happy day she found herself over and over again at Billy's side, listening to

n she and Billy had gone up to the big woods; she remembered the odor of roses

babies spent a happy week in Anna's old room. Betsey was filling what had b

tfully, when the time for packing came. "Couldn't y

office any longer. They crossed the bay in mid-afternoon, and the radiant husband and father met them at the fe

ut Billy answered by signaling a carriag

Susan said, sinking back wi

t come home every day

f the summer was over. Mission Street slept under a soft au

table and new chairs replaced the old ones, a ruffled little cotton house-gown

into his new coach, and Susan put her arms about

ahy sent the carri

wife!" Susan found nothing in life so bracing as the arm that was now tight a

s all ordered, and the things are here,

ing comfortable and we'll put them off, and you can set the table while I get dinner! It's been a heave

ay to trust herself to the rough life of the cabin. But they came back after a month's gypsying so brown and strong and happy that even Susan had forgotten the horrors of the winte

oomy and comfortable, and she gloried in the big yards, the fruit trees, and the old-fashioned garden. She cared for her sweet-pea vines and her chickens while the little boys tumbled abou

more than a few hours at a time. Susan had to let some of the old friends go; she had neither the gowns nor the time for afternoon calls, nor had she the knowledge of small current events that is more important than eit

gs and soups, too anxious to have thirty little brown stockings and twenty little blue suits hanging on the line every Monday morning to jeopardize the even running of her domestic machinery with very much hospitality. She loved to have any or all of the Carrolls with her, welcomed Bi

d silenced all of Susan's objections--Susan must bring the boys; they would have dinner with Isabel's own boy, Alan, then the children could all go to sleep in the Furlong nursery, a

I haven't a gown

selves and Daddy a

n up my black--

iasm carried the day. The Olivers went to dine and spen

for the occasion. The boys' wardrobes, too, were supplemented with various touches that raised them nearer the level of young Alan's clothes;

nd strange. Her mood communicated itself somewhat to Billy, but Billy forgot all lesser emotions in the heat of a discussion into which he entered with Isabel's father during dinner. The old man was interested, tole

the road to show her the pretty house that had been the Wallaces

e, old-fashioned, elegant, comfortable and spacious. The upper windows gave on the tree-hidden ro

e could live here, what bli

of the question! B

submitted Isabel dubio

w. We pay six per cent

that house?" Isabel s

gh the handsome iron fence at horsemen and motor-cars passing by. She saw them growing up among such princely children as little

f because the question of tipping or not tipping Isabel's chauffeur spoiled the last ha

th a score or two of little laundry-workers, waitresses and factory girls on every Tuesday evening. Sometimes it was hard to leave the home lamp-light, and come out into the cold on Tue

ways and means from their standpoint. Susan became very popular; the girls laughed with her, copied her, confided in her. At the monthly dances they introduced her t

blind. Virginia, with her little class to teach, and her responsibilities when the children were in the refectory and dormitory, was a changed creatu

e!" said Virginia, saying good-bye to Mart and Billy. "But _I_ kn

for words. "God has given us everything in the world!" she would say

ance up from the book she was stamping, and at the sight of Susan and the children, her whole plain face would brighten. She always came out

ary's

t night! And she's never alone, everyone in the neighborhood loves her---!" Miss Lord would accompany them t

the boys with her. The doctor wanted a glimpse of her between his operations and his lectures, would not eat his belated lunch unless his lovely wife sat opposite him, and planned a hundred delights for each of their little holidays. Anna lived only for him, her color

continued Susan, "but, at the same time, I don't turn pale, start up, and whisper, 'Oh, it's Willie!' when you happen to come home half an hour earlier than usual. I don't sta

predicted comfortably. "Then they'll

said Susan wisely, "but I do

er was born, and the whole household welcomed the tiny Jos

who had come flying home in mid-morning. "Now I feel like David Copperfield's landlady, 'at last I have summat I can love!' Oh, the m

for a few days?" asked Billy, who was kneelin

widened with

e asked, cool finger

urther use for the sex,

absorb me yet," she said. "I'll continue a sort of super

ed that he was well again and had given up aeronautics, and was going around the world to add to his matchless collection of semi-precious stones. Susan was sobered one day to hear of Emily Saunders' sudden death. She sat for a long time wondering over the empty an

hunted through files nearby for some lost reference, shocked her suddenly with the sight of S

arm, big room. At the desk the librarian was whispering with two nervous-looking young women. At one of the file-racks, Billy stood slowly turning page after page of a heap of papers. Susan looked at him, trying to see the ki

without a voice, and wi

ing to his paper, she opened her London she

Mrs. Bromley Rose-Rogers for the season, and were being extensively entertained. Mr. and Mrs. Bocqueraz would thus be near their daug

im gave the thing the importance inseparable from the fact withheld t

osing time, Billy delighted to have found his referen

ed William. Su

my expenses," she stipulat

nd sat over the coarse little table-cloth for a long half-hour, contentedly eating and talking. Fortified, they walked

ort. Still their mother ran upstairs. Children had been known

ng for drinks, from the next room, Josephine wide-eyed and dewy, through the bars of her crib. Sus

ng was quiet. Susan found herself lying

il

he asked, ro

s' to-night," Susan began. She repeated the pa

his wife," said Billy. "Circumst

don't think he ever me

to get it. I think that, if it had been possible, he would have got

ndered i

lame," she

t as much as he was--and

dvantages of laws is that you can follow them blind, when you've lost all your moorings. You can't follow your instincts, but you can remember your rule. I've thought a lot about Stephen Bocqueraz in the past few years, and I don't believe he meant to do anything terribly wrong and, as things turned out, I think he really did me more good than harm! I'm confident that but for him I wou

was

, in quick uneasine

of deep and placid breathing answered h

imness. Then the absurdity of the thi

ld, EVERYTHING we do here will seem just