ou and I could have gone with any of 'em
if we'd tried hard enough. Look at the people we knew then that do hold
their heads up alongside of anybody in this town! WHY can they? Because
the men of those families made money and gave their children everything
that makes life worth living! Why can't we hold our heads up? Because
those men passed you in the race. They went up the ladder, and
you--you're still a clerk down at that old hole!"

"You leave that out, please," he said. "I thought you were going to tell
me something Henrietta Lamb had done to our Alice."

"You BET I'm going to tell you," she assured him, vehemently. "But first
I'm telling WHY she does it. It's because you've never given Alice any
backing nor any background, and they all know they can do anything they
like to her with perfect impunity. If she had the hundredth part of what
THEY have to fall back on she'd have made 'em sing a mighty different
song long ago!"

"How would she?"

"Oh, my heavens, but you're slow!" Mrs. Adams moaned. "Look here! You
remember how practically all the nicest boys in this town used to come
here a few years ago. Why, they were all crazy over her; and the girls
HAD to be nice to her then. Look at the difference now! There'll be a
whole month go by and not a young man come to call on her, let alone
send her candy or flowers, or ever think of TAKING her any place and
yet she's prettier and brighter than she was when they used to come. It
isn't the child's fault she couldn't hold 'em, is it? Poor thing, SHE
tried hard enough! I suppose you'd say it was her fault, though."

"No; I wouldn't."

"Then whose fault is it?"

"Oh, mine, mine," he said, wearily. "I drove the young men away, of
course."

"You might as well have driven 'em, Virgil. It amounts to just the same
thing."

"How does it?"

"Because as they got older a good many of 'em began to think more about
money; that's one thing. Money's at the bottom of it all, for that
matter. Look at these country clubs and all such things: the other
girls' families belong and we don't, and Alice don't; and she can't go
unless somebody takes her, and nobody does any more. Look at the other
girls' houses, and then look at our house, so shabby and old-fashioned
she'd be pretty near ashamed to ask anybody to come in and sit down
nowadays! Look at her clothes--oh, yes; you think you shelled out a lot
for that little coat of hers and the hat and skirt she got last March;
but it's