iator. They knew,
too, that young Hatton was an infantry lieutenant somewhere in the
East. These letters were not from him.

Ever since her home-coming, Angie had been sewing at the Red Cross shop
on Grand Avenue. Chippewa boasted two Red Cross shops. The Grand
Avenue shop was the society shop. The East End crowd sewed there,
capped, veiled, aproned--and unapproachable. Were your fingers ever so
deft, your knowledge of seams and basting mathematical, your skill with
that complicated garment known as a pneumonia jacket uncanny, if you
did not belong to the East End set, you did not sew at the Grand Avenue
shop. No matter how grossly red the blood which the Grand Avenue
bandages and pads were ultimately to stanch, the liquid in the fingers
that rolled and folded them was pure cerulean.

Tessie and her crowd had never thought of giving any such service to
their country. They spoke of the Grand Avenue workers as "that
stinkin' bunch." Yet each one of the girls was capable of starting a
blouse in an emergency on Saturday night and finishing it in time for a
Sunday picnic, buttonholes and all. Their help might have been
invaluable. It never was asked.

Without warning, Chuck came home on three days' furlough. It meant
that he was bound for France right enough this time. But Tessie didn't
care.

"I don't care where you're goin'," she said exultantly, her eyes
lingering on the stocky, straight, powerful figure in its rather
ill-fitting khaki. "You're here now. That's enough. Ain't you tickled
to be home, Chuck? Gee!"

"I'll say," responded Chuck. But even he seemed to detect some lack in
his tone and words. He elaborated somewhat shamefacedly:

"Sure. It's swell to be home. But I don't know. After you've
traveled around, and come back, things look so kind of little to you.
I don't know--kind of----" He floundered about, at a loss for
expression. Then tried again: "Now, take Hatton's place, for example.
I always used to think it was a regular palace, but, gosh, you ought to
see places where I was asked to in San Francisco and around there.
Why, they was--were--enough to make the Hatton house look like a shack.
Swimmin' pools of white marble, and acres of yard like a park, and the
help always bringing you something to eat or drink. And the folks
themselves--why, say! Here we are scraping and bowing to Hattons and
that bunch. They're pikers to what some people are that invited me to
their houses in