installed at the office. Anne struggled bravely to hide her mental
and physical discomfort from Jim. Jim, cut to the heart to have to
add anything to her care just now, touched her with a thousand
little tendernesses; a joke over the burned pudding, a little name
she had not heard since honeymoon days, a hundred barefoot
expeditions about the bedroom in the dark, when Jinny awoke crying
in the night, or Diego could not sleep because he was so "firsty."
Tender and intimate days these, but the strain of them told on both
husband and wife.

Things were at this point on the particular dark afternoon that
found Anne with the two children at the window. All three were still
staring out into the early dusk when Helma came in from the kitchen
with an armful of damp little garments:

"Ef aye sprad dese hare, dey be dray en no tayme?" suggested Helma.

"Oh, yes! Spread them here by all means; then you can get a good
start with your ironing to-morrow!" Anne agreed, rousing herself
from her revery. "Put them all around the fire. And I MUST
straighten this room!" she said, half to herself; "it's getting on
to five!"

Followed by the stumbling children, she went briskly about the room,
reducing it to order with a practised hand. Toys were piled in a
large basket, scraps tossed into the fire, sewing materials gathered
together and put out of sight, the rugs laid smoothly, the window-
shades drawn. Anne "brushed up" the floor, pushed chairs against the
wall, put a shovelful of coals on the fire, and finally took her
rocker at the hearth, and sat with Virginia in her arms, and Diego