s the
visitor's approving eyes noted the general order and warmth, the
blue-checked towels and blue bowls, the white table and white walls. The
little harum-scarum baby of the family was proceeding to get her husband
a most satisfactory and delicious little dinner, and Aunt Kate was proud
of her.

"Did you make that cake, darling?"

"Indeed I did; she can't make cake!"

"And the ham?"

"Well"--Norma eyed the cut ham fondly--"we did that together, out of the
book! And I wish you'd taste it, Aunt Kate, it is perfectly delicious. I
give it to Wolf every other night, but I think he'd eat it three times a
day and be delighted. And last week we made bread--awfully good,
too--not hard like that bread we made last summer. Rolls, we
made--cinnamon rolls and plain. Harry and Rose were here. And
Thanksgiving I'm going to try mincemeat."

"You're a born cook," Aunt Kate said, paying one of her highest
compliments with due gravity. But Norma did not respond with her usual
buoyancy. She sighed impatiently, and her face fell into lines of
discontent and sadness that did not escape the watching eyes. Mrs.
Sheridan changed the subject to the one of a cousin of Harry Redding,
one Mrs. Barry with whose problems Norma was already dismally familiar.
Mrs. Barry's husband was sick in a hospital, and she herself had to have
an expensive operation, and the smallest of the four children had some
trouble hideously like infantile paralysis.

Norma knew that Aunt Kate would have liked to have her offer to take at
least one of the small and troublesome children for two or three days,
if not to stay with the unfortunate Kitty Barry outright. She knew that
there was almost no money, that all the household details of washing and
cooking were piling up like a mountain about the ailing woman, but her
heart was filled with sudden rebellion and impatience with the whole
miserable scheme.

"My goodness, Aunt Kate, if it isn't one thing with those people it's
another!" she said, impatiently. "I suppose you were there, and up with
that baby all night!"

"Indeed I got some fine sleep," Mrs. Sheridan answered, innocently.
"Poor things, they're very brave!"

Norma said nothing, but her expression was not sympathetic. She had been
thinking of herself as to be pitied, and this ruthless introduction of
the Barry question entirely upset the argument. If Mary Bishop and
Katrina Thayer were the standard, then Norma Sheridan's life was too
utterly obscure