can't do, and I feel just exactly as if I was caught in some kind of a
cage and couldn't get out. There was that Mrs. Emerson--she wanted me to
join a club she belongs to. She said it used to be a literary club, but
that they'd changed their plans, and, instead of writin' papers, they'd
decided to do civic work."

She paused in her passionate confession and turned abruptly to David
with a look of self-scorn that was tragic in its intensity. "Do you know
what 'civic work' is, David?" David did not answer at once.

"Why, no, Sarah, I can't say I do," he said cautiously. "It seems to me
I've seen that word somewhere, and maybe I could think up what it means,
if you'd give me time to--"

Sarah cut him short. "You don't know what that word means, David, and
neither do I," she said with studied calmness.

David was genuinely puzzled by Sarah's evident distress over so
unimportant a circumstance as the meaning of a word. "Honey," he said
tenderly, "I'll go right down town and buy you a dictionary, so you can
find out what that word means. But what difference does it make,
anyhow?"

Once more his wife turned on him a face that was like a mask of tragedy.
"What difference does it make?" she wailed. "Oh, David! Can't you see?
Can't you understand? There I sat--in my own house--like a fool--not
knowin' what answer to give her, just because I didn't know what that
word meant! And every day something like this happens, something that
makes me feel that I'm out of place, something that makes me hate
myself! Can't you understand?"

Yes, David understood as well as a man could be expected to understand a
woman. Many times since Fortune had smiled on him, he had been thrown
with men of superior education and social position and had known
momentarily the feeling of being out of place. And if Sarah's
passionate words failed to convey all she felt and suffered, the despair
in her eyes and the nervous twitching of her fingers brought
comprehension to her husband's mind.

"There! There!" he soothed, taking her hands in his. "You mustn't carry
on this way, Sarah, or I'll have to send for the doctor again. Just give
me time to think; there must be a way out of this trouble. My goodness!"
He shook his head in helpless wonderment over the strange situation. "I
thought we'd be through with troubles when we got rich, but it looks as
if this money's the most trouble we ever had."

"It wouldn't be a trouble if we were used to it," explained