k hope, but each time it was
doomed to disappointment. Always they had had to move on,--to make a new
circle of temporary acquaintances, to learn the ropes of new streets and
shops and schools all over again. Always it was "business" that did the
mischief,--the failure of "business" here or the hope of better
"business" somewhere else that had routed them out of their temporary
shelter. Horatio Ridge was "travelling" for one firm or another in drugs
and chemicals: he was of an optimistic and sanguine temperament. Milly's
mother, less hopeful by nature, had gradually succumbed under the
perpetual tearing up of her thin roots, and finally faded away
altogether in the light housekeeping phase of their existence in St.
Louis.

Milly was sanguine like her father, and she had the other advantage of
youth over her mother. So she had hoped again--overwhelmingly--of
Chicago. But as she gazed at the row of pallid houses and counted three
"To rent" signs in the cobwebby front windows opposite, she knew in her
heart that this was not the end--not this, for her! It was another
shift, another compromise to be endured, another disappointment to be
overcome.

"Well, daughter, what d'ye think of your new home?" Little Horatio's
blustering tone betrayed his timidity before the passionate criticism of
youth. Milly turned on him with flashing blue eyes.

"I think, my dear," her grandmother announced primly, "that instead of
finding fault with your father's selection of a home, you had better
look at it first."

Grandma Ridge was a tiny lady, quite frail, with neat bands of iron-gray
hair curling over well-shaped ears. Her voice was soft and low,--the
kind of voice which her generation described as "ladylike." But Milly
knew what lay beneath its gentle surface. Milly did not love her
grandmother. Milly's mother had not loved the little old lady. It was
extremely doubtful if any one had ever loved her. Mrs. Ridge embodied
unpleasant duties; she was a vessel of unwelcome reproof that could be
counted upon to spill over at raw moments, like this one.

"You'll like it first rate, Milly," her father continued robustly, "once
you get settled in it. It's a great bargain, the real estate man said
so, almost new and freshly painted and papered. It's close to the cars
and Hoppers'"--Hoppers' was the Chicago firm that had offered Horatio
his latest opportunity. "And I don't care about travelling all over
Illinois to get to my work...."

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