view a spectacle. Slowly, comprehendingly, dispassionately she shook her
head. "It would be--no use."

"Perhaps," Katie acquiesced. "Some of the very nicest things in life
are--no use. But I have something planned. May I tell you what it is I
want to do?"

Still she did not take her eyes from Katie's kindling face, looking at it
as at something a long way off and foreign.

"I am not a philanthropist, have no fears of that. But I have an idea, a
theory, that what seem small things are perhaps the only things in life
to help the big things. For instance, a hot bath. I can't think of any
sorrow in the world that a hot bath wouldn't help, just a little bit."

"Now we have such a beautiful bathroom. I loathe hot baths in tiny
bathrooms, where the air gets all steamy and you can't get your breath.
Perhaps one thing the matter with you is that all the bathrooms you've
been in lately were too small. Of course, you didn't _know_ that was one
thing the matter; like once at a dance I thought I was very sad about a
man's dancing so much with another girl, a new girl--don't you loathe
'new girls'?--but when I got home I found that one of my dress stays was
digging into me and when I got my dress off I didn't feel half so broken
up about the man."

An odd thing happened; one thing struck away came back. There was a light
in the eyes telling that something human and understanding, something to
link her to other things human, would like to come back. She looked and
listened as to something nearer.