over her shoulder like the ghost of wasted opportunities.

"I look awful, don't I?" she said at last with a happy sigh.

Ally smiled and took back the hat. "I'll stitch the roses on right here,
so's you can put it away at once."

Charity laughed, and ran her fingers through her rough dark hair.
She knew that Harney liked to see its reddish edges ruffled about her
forehead and breaking into little rings at the nape. She sat down on her
bed and watched Ally stoop over the hat with a careful frown.

"Don't you ever feel like going down to Nettleton for a day?" she asked.

Ally shook her head without looking up. "No, I always remember that
awful time I went down with Julia--to that doctor's."

"Oh, Ally----"

"I can't help it. The house is on the corner of Wing Street and Lake
Avenue. The trolley from the station goes right by it, and the day the
minister took us down to see those pictures I recognized it right off,
and couldn't seem to see anything else. There's a big black sign with
gold letters all across the front--'Private Consultations.' She came as
near as anything to dying...."

"Poor Julia!" Charity sighed from the height of her purity and her
security. She had a friend whom she trusted and who respected her.
She was going with him to spend the next day--the Fourth of July--at
Nettleton. Whose business was it but hers, and what was the harm? The