at because of this or that she would not have a
"hard time," and she had had a very hard time. They had told her that
she would forget the cruel pain the instant it was over, and she knew
she never would forget it. It made her shudder weakly to think of all
the babies in the world--of the schools packed with children--at what a
cost!

Emeline recovered quickly, and shut her resentment into her own breast.
Julie, as she was always called, was a cross baby, and nowadays the two
front rooms were usually draped with her damp undergarments, and odorous
of sour bottles and drying clothes. For the few months that Emeline
nursed the child she wandered about until late in the day in a loose
wrapper, a margin of draggled nightgown showing under it, her hair in a
tumbled knot at the back of her head. If she had to run out for a loaf
of bread or a pound of coffee, she slipped on a street skirt, and
buttoned her long coat about her; her lean young throat would show, bare
above the lapels of the coat, but even this costume was not conspicuous
in that particular neighbourhood.

By the time Julia was weaned, Emeline had formed the wrapper habit; she
had also slipped back to the old viewpoint: they were poor people, and
the poor couldn't afford to do things decently, to live comfortably.
Emeline scolded and snapped at George, shook and scolded the crying
baby, and loitered in the hall for long, complaining gossips with the
other women of the house.

Time extricated the young Pages from these troubled days. Julia grew
into a handsome, precocious little girl of whom both parents could be
proud. Emeline never quite recovered her girlish good looks, her face
was thin now, with prominent cheek bones; there was a little frowning
line drawn between her eyes, and her expression was sharp and anxious,
but she became more fond of dress than ever.

George's absences were a little longer in these days; he had been given
a larger territory to cover--and Emeline naturally turned for society
toward her women neighbours. There were one or two very congenial
married women of her own type in the same house, pleasure-loving,
excitable young women; one, a Mrs. Carter, with two children in school,
the other, Mrs. Palmer, triumphantly childless. These introduced her to
others; sometimes half a dozen of them would go to a matinee together, a
noisy, chattering group. During the matinee Julia would sit on her
mother's lap, a small awed figure in a brief red