arded with the
touch of finger tips.

As for George, he found himself liking this affair rather more than
usual. There was no denying that the child was tremendously
attractive--with her youth and beauty and the reserve which like a stone
wall seemed now and then to shut her in. He had always a feeling that he
would like to climb over the wall. It had pricked his interest to find
in this little creature a strength and delicacy which he had found in no
other woman.

He had had one or two letters from Madge, and had answered them with a
line. She gave rather generously of her correspondence and her letters
were never dull. In the last one she had asked him to join her on the
North Shore.

"I am sorry," she said, "for the new little girl. I have a feeling
that she won't know how to play the game and that you'll hurt her.
You will probably think that I am jealous, but I can't help that.
Men always think that women are jealous when it comes to other
women. They never seem to understand that we are trying to keep the
world straight.

"Oscar writes that Flora isn't well, that all her other guests are
gone except you--and that she wants me. But why should I come? I
wish he wouldn't ask me. Something always tugs at my heart when I
think of Flora. She has so much and yet so little. She and Oscar
would be much happier in a flat on the West Side with Flora cooking
in a kitchenette, and Oscar bringing things home from the
delicatessen. He would buy bologna and potato salad on Sunday
nights, and perhaps they would slice up a raw onion. It sounds
dreadful, doesn't it? But there are thousands of people doing just
that thing, Georgie, and being very happy over it. And it wouldn't
be dreadful for Flora and Oscar because they would be right where
they belong, and the potato salad and the bologna and the little
room where Oscar could sit with his coat off would be much more to
their liking than their present pomp and elegance. You and I are
different. You could never play any part pleasantly but that of
Prince Charming, and I should hate the kitchenette. I want wide
spaces, and old houses, and deep fireplaces--my people far back
were like that--I sometimes wonder why I stick to Flora--perhaps it
is because she clung to me in those days when Oscar was drafted and
had to go, and she cried so hard in the Red C