everybody--till I find out."

"But you mustn't do that," protested Ruth, flinging herself from
left to right impatiently. "What is it you want to know?"

"About my mother--and what she did. And why I have no
father--why I'm not like you--and the other girls."

"Oh--it's nothing. I can't explain. Don't bother about it. It's
no use. It can't be helped. And it doesn't really matter."

"I've been thinking," said Susan. "I understand a great many
things I didn't know I'd noticed--ever since I was a baby. But
what I don't understand----" She drew a long breath, a cautious
breath, as if there were danger of awakening a pain. "What I don't
understand is--why. And--you must tell me all about it. . . . Was
my mother bad?"

"Not exactly bad," Ruth answered uncertainly. "But she did one
thing that was wicked--at least that a woman never can be
forgiven for, if it's found out."

"Did she--did she take something that didn't belong to her?"

"No--nothing like that. No, she was, they say, as nice and sweet
as she could be--except----She wasn't married to your father."

Susan sat in a brown study. "I can't understand," she said at
last. "Why--she _must_ have been married, or--or--there wouldn't
have been me."