to be a wild, jagged thing--a reaching out, a
groping after. It was called "Souls Antagonistic: A Symphony." I wore an
especial costume--"suited to the subject," said mamma. "A sweet poem of
a gown," echoed Mrs. Babbington Brooks. When I finished my task, for it
was a task, and imposed by a hard task-master, Mrs. Brooks glided, like
the serpent she is, over to my seat and looked down with a false longing
into my flushed face. Then in a low, somewhat musical voice, full of a
false tenderness and a borrowed pathos, "May I, sweet young girl, touch
with mine the precious lips which to-night have made exceeding glad my
sad, sad soul with those wise and honeyed words?" She kissed me. I
fairly trembled with an intense loathing. That oily-tongued creature
hates me with a deadly hatred. And she fears me, for she knows that I
have found her out and know her to be what she is, a most _successful
fashionable fraud_. But it is folly to run counter to the social
current. It is best to hold my peace. It is hard to do, but it can be,
and it must be done. I was nervous--rebellious. I quickly fled away from
that false woman and her loathsome caress. I sought rest and quiet in a
distant cushioned corner of the deserted hallway. I was angry--too angry
for tears. I buried my throbbing head in my hands and tried to forget my
miserable existence; it was such a failure. It was so unlike that which
I wished it to be, and yet I did not have the will-power to make it so.
I was in one of my morbid moods. Resolutions I knew to be useless. On
the morrow they would be broken. It was always, and I fear ever will be
"Mother and Daughter;" never "Daughter and Mother." She always takes the
lead, and I, always weak enough to follow. Was there no one to whom I
could turn? No one to yield me a few kindly words to strengthen me for
that constant, useless warfare against, yes, against my own mother?

As if in answer to my silent call, a footstep! My hands dropped into my
lap. A man stood near. I did not look up; I knew who he was. We need
hear but once the footfall of certain people and always after know
instantly if they are near. A voice: "Miss Gilder, do I intrude?"

Robert Fairfield is not a man of many words. He stood by me in an
attitude of _sympathetic silence_. He made to me an unspoken
appeal. In my heart there was a grateful answer. A sad, smileless face
was uplifted, and then my lips also gave answer. It was a brief story.
It was my daily life of h