rought her meals had gone to bed. She knew
nobody--only voices, the voices of other boarders who went up and down
the stairs and sometimes paused outside her door to talk and laugh or
exchange gossip. She had caught a few names from occasional greeting or
exclamation: "Good morning, Miss Marland!" "Why, Mrs. Elsbree!" "How was
the show last night, Miss Bessett?" "Oh, Mrs. Teed, would you mind
mailing these letters as you go out?" "Not at all, Mrs. Braywood."

They were as formless to her as ghosts, but she could not help imagining
bodies and faces and clothes to fit the voices. She could not help
forming likes and dislikes. She would have been glad to have any of them
come to see her, to ask how she was or admire the baby, or to borrow a
pin or lend a book.

If somebody did not come to see her she would go mad. If only she dared,
she would leave the baby and steal down the stairs and out of the front
door and slip along the streets. They called her; they beckoned to her
and promised her happiness. She was like a little yacht held fast in a
cove by a little anchor. The breeze was full of summons and nudgings;
the water in the bay was dancing, every ripple a giggle. Only her anchor
held her, such a little anchor, such a gripping anchor!

If only some one would come in! If only the baby could talk, or even
listen with understanding! She was afraid to be alone any longer, lest
she do something insane and fearful. She sat at the window, with one arm
stretched out across the sill and her chin across it, and stared off
into the city's well of white lights. Then she bent her head, hid her
hot face in the hollow of her elbow, and clenched her eyelids to shut
away the torment. She was loneliest staring at the city, but she was
unendurably lonely with her eyes shut. She would go crazy if somebody
did not come.

There was a knock at the door. It startled her.

She sat up and listened. The knock was repeated softly. She turned her
head and stared at the door. Then she murmured, "Come in."

The door whispered open, and a woman in soft black skirts whispered in.
The room was lighted only by the radiance from the sky, and the
mysterious woman was mysteriously vague against the dimly illuminated
hall.

She closed the door after her and stood, a shadow in a shadow. Even her
face was a mere glimmer, like a patch of moonlight on the door, and her
voice was stealthy as a breeze. It was something like the voice she
heard called "Mrs.