by for a rainy day, and fell to work again when her brief vacation
was over.

Hearing of a chance for a good needle-woman in a large and
well-conducted mantua-making establishment, she secured it as a
temporary thing, for she wanted to divert her mind from that last
sad experience by entirely different employment and surroundings.
She liked to return at night to her own little home, solitary and
simple as it was, and felt a great repugnance to accept any place
where she would be mixed up with family affairs again.

So day after day she went to her seat in the workroom where a dozen
other young women sat sewing busily on gay garments, with as much
lively gossip to beguile the time as Miss Cotton, the forewoman,
would allow.

For a while it diverted Christie, as she had a feminine love for
pretty things, and enjoyed seeing delicate silks, costly lace, and
all the indescribable fantasies of fashion. But as spring came on,
the old desire for something fresh and free began to haunt her, and
she had both waking and sleeping dreams of a home in the country
somewhere, with cows and flowers, clothes bleaching on green grass,
bob-o'-links making rapturous music by the river, and the smell of
new-mown hay, all lending their charms to the picture she painted
for herself.

Most assuredly she would have gone to find these things, led by the
instincts of a healthful nature, had not one slender tie held her
till it grew into a bond so strong she could not break it.