which she had always viewed all creation. That smile which came from
without, not within, but now it was fairly tragic.

"Her name is Evelyn. Don't you think it is a pretty name?" asked Ida.

"Yes'm," replied Maria. She edged towards the door. The nurse,
tossing the wailing baby, rose and got a bottle of milk. Maria went
out.

Maria went to school the next Monday, and all the girls asked her if
the baby was pretty.

"It looks like all the babies I ever saw," replied Maria guardedly.
She did not wish to descry the baby which was, after all, her sister,
but she privately thought it was a terrible sight.

Gladys Mann supported her. "Babies do all look alike," said she.
"We've had nine to our house, and I had ought to know."

At first Maria used to dread to go home from school, on account of
the baby. She had a feeling of repulsion because of it, but gradually
that feeling disappeared and an odd sort of fascination possessed her
instead. She thought a great deal about the baby. When she heard it
cry in the night, she thought that her father and Ida might have
sense enough to stop it. She thought that she could stop its crying
herself, by carrying it very gently around the room. Still she did
not love the baby. It only appealed, in a general way, to her
instincts. But one day, when the baby was some six weeks old, and Ida
had gone to New York, she came home from school, and she went up to
her own room, and she heard the baby crying in the room opposite. It