CHAPTER II

In summer the rear parlour that was Mrs. Page's bedroom was a rather dim
and dreary place; such light as it had fell through one long, high
window that gave only upon a narrow air shaft; it was only in mid-July
that the actual sunlight--a bright and fleeting triangle--touched the
worn red carpet and the curly-maple bed. In winter the window gave
almost no light at all. Julia dressed by gaslight ten months out of the
year, and had to sit up in her warm blankets and stare at the clock on a
certain January morning in her fifteenth year, to make sure whether it
said twenty minutes of eleven or five minutes of eight o'clock. It was
five minutes of eight--no mistake about it--but eight o'clock was early
for the Pages, mother and daughter. Julia sighed, and cautiously
stretched forth an arm, a bare, shapely little arm, with bangles on the
round wrist and rings on the smooth fingers, and picked a book from the
floor. Cautiously settling herself on the pillows she plunged into her
novel, now and then pushing back a loose strand of hair, or bringing her
pretty fingernails close to her eyes for an admiring and critical
scrutiny.

An hour passed--another hour. The clock in the front room struck a
silvery ten. Then Julia slammed her book noisily together, and gave a
sharp push to the recumbent form beside her.

"Ah--no--darling!" moaned Mrs. Page, tortured out of dreams.
"Don't--Julie--"

"Aw, wake up, Mama!" the daughter urged. Whereupon the older woman
rolled on her back, yawned luxuriously, and said, quite composedly: