Mrs. Snow. In any exigency, any
mind-and body-absorbing event of life, the inopportune presence of Mrs.
Snow was inexorably to be counted on, though it came always as one of
those exasperating recurrences which bring with them a ridiculously
fresh irritation each time. It seemed to be the one extra thing you
couldn't stand. In either trouble or joy, she affected one like a
clinging, ankle-flapping mackintosh on a rainy day. She bowed now to
Dosia with a patronizing dignity, pointed by the plaintive warmth of the
greeting to Lois, who had come hurrying down-stairs out of those
passion-depths of darkness, so that Mrs. Snow wouldn't suspect anything.
She had an uncanny faculty of divining just what you didn't want her to.

Once before Lois had suspended tragedy for Mrs. Snow. The same things
happen to us over and over again daily in our crowded yet restricted
lives--it is we who change in our meeting with them. We have our great
passions, our great joys, our heartbreaks, no matter how small our
environment.

"How do you do, my dear? Mr. Girard has just told me that he was going
to stay here to-night, in Mr. Alexander's absence. He said little Redge
was threatened with the croup. Now, if I had only known that Mr.
Alexander was away, _I_ could have come and stayed with you!"

"Oh, that wasn't at all necessary," said Lois hastily. "Thank you very
much. Do sit down, won't you, Mrs. Snow?"

"Only for a minute, then; I must go back to Bertha," said Mrs. Snow,
seating herself and fumbling for something under her cloak. "I just came
over to read you a letter. It's in my bag--I can't seem to find it.
Well, perhaps I'd better rest for a minute." Mrs. Snow's face looked
unusually lined and set; in spite of her plaintiveness, her eyes had a
harassed glitter.

"Isn't it rather late for you to be out alone?" asked Lois.

"Yes; Ada would have come around here with me, but she was expecting Mr.
Sutton. She was expecting him last night, but he didn't come. If _I_
were a young lady, I'd let a gentleman wait for _me_ the next time; it
used to be thought more attractive, in my day: but Ada's so afraid of
not seeming cordial; gentlemen seem to be so sensitive nowadays! I said
to her, 'Ada, when a man is enough at home in a house to kick the cat,
and ask for cake whenever he feels like it, I do _not_ see that it is
necessary to stand on ceremony with him.' But Ada thinks differently."

"It is difficult to make rules," said Lois vaguely.