ore." He shrugged a shoulder and
looked Bruce up and down--at his coat too tight across the chest, at his
sleeves, too short for his length of arm, at his clumsy miner's shoes,
as though to emphasize the gulf which lay between Bruce's condition and
his own. Then with his eyes bright with vindictiveness and his hateful
smile of confidence upon his lips, he stood in his setting of affluence
and power waiting for Bruce to go, that he might close the door.

XII

THORNS--AND A FEW ROSES

Helen Dunbar was exercising that doubtful economy, walking to save
car-fare, when she saw Mae Smith with her eyes fixed upon her in deadly
purpose making a bee-line across the street. If there was any one thing
more needed to complete her depression it was a meeting with Mae Smith.

She stopped and waited, trying to think what it was Mae Smith resembled
when she hurried like that. A penguin! that was it--Mae Smith walked
exactly like a penguin. But Helen did not smile at the comparison,
instead, she continued to look somberly and critically at the woman who
approached. When Helen was low spirited, as now, Mae Smith always rose
before her like a spectre. She saw herself at forty another such passe
newspaper woman trudging from one indifferent editor to another peddling
"space." And why not? Mae Smith had been young and good-looking once,
also a local celebrity in her way when she had signed a column in a
daily. But she had grown stale with the grind, and having no special
talent or personality had been easily replaced when a new Managing
Editor came. Now, though chipper as a sparrow, she was always in need of
a small loan.

As Helen stood on the corner, in her tailor-made, which was the last
word in simplicity and good lines, the time looked very remote when she,
too, would be peddling space in a $15 gown, that had faded in streaks,
but Helen had no hallucinations concerning her own ability. She knew
that she had no great aptitude for her work and realized that her
success was due more often to the fact that she was young, well-dressed,
and attractive than to any special talent. This was all very well now,
while she got results, but what about the day when _her_ shoes spread
over the soles and turned over at the heels, and she bought _her_ blouse
"off the pile?" When her dollar gloves were shabby and would not button
at the wrist? What about the day when she was too dispirited to dress
her hair becomingly, but combed it straight