e such
different interests now. All they can talk about is their housekeeping
or their babies. Most of the boys have gone away, too. I don't wonder.
Anybody with any ambition would get away from such a place if it were
within the range of possibilities."

Cousin Barbara had seated herself in a low rocking-chair and was pulling
the basting threads from a finished garment. "Listen!" she said, "isn't
that Amy calling again?" An excited little voice came shrilly up the
stairs.

"Look, Judith! Mrs. Avery is coming back again! What do you suppose is
the matter?"

The omnibus dashing down the road stopped suddenly at the gate opposite.
The door burst open, and the dignified Mr. Avery, in undignified haste,
ran breathlessly toward the house, while Marguerite called out a
laughing explanation to her friend at the window.

"I left my watch on the dressing-table and my purse with my trunk keys
in it, and we've only six minutes to catch the train. Isn't that just my
way? Look at Algernon run! I wouldn't have believed it of him. Well, it
has given me another chance to remind you that you are to come to me in
February. You needn't shake your head. I'll not take 'no' for an answer.
You're so good at planning, Judith, I'm sure you can arrange it some
way."

Then as her husband returned, red-faced and breathless, she leaned out
of the 'bus, and laughingly blew an airy kiss from her fingertips.

"That's just like her!" exclaimed Judith. "She's as irresponsible and
careless as a child. She was always late to school, and losing her
pencils and forgetting her books. We used to call her 'Daisy
Dilly-dally.' She's such a dear little butterfly, though, and it doesn't
seem possible that we are the same age--twenty-three. I feel like a
patriarch beside her."

"So she has invited you to visit her in Washington," began Miss Barbara.
"I am glad of that. It will be such a fine change for you."

To her surprise, the gray eyes filled with tears, and in her effort to
wink them back Judith did not reply for a moment. Then she answered,
lightly, "Yes; it would be a golden opportunity if I could only afford
to accept, but the wolf is still at the door, Cousin Barbara. It has
stood in the way of everything I ever longed to do. Even when a child I
used to hear so much about it that I thought it was a veritable
flesh-and-blood wolf. Many a night I slipped out of bed and peered
through the curtain, all a-shiver. I wanted to see if its fiery eyeballs