erward to the desolate Barrys', and wished that she had put
her arms about the big square shoulders, and her cheek against her
aunt's cheek, and said that she was sorry to be unreasonable.

Rushing to another extreme of unreason, she decided that she and Wolf
must go see Rose to-night--and perhaps the Barrys, too--and cheer and
solace them all. And Norma indulged in a little dream of herself nursing
and cooking in the Barrys' six little cluttered rooms, and earning
golden opinions from all the group. There was money, too; she had not
used all of October's allowance, and to-morrow would find another big
check at the bank.

Wolf interrupted by coming in so tired he could hardly move. He ate his
dinner, yawned amiably in the kitchen while she cleared it away, and was
so sound asleep at nine o'clock that Norma's bedside light and the
rustling of the pages of her book, three feet away from his face, had no
more effect upon him than if the three feet had been three hundred.

And then the bitter mood came back to her again; the bored, restless,
impatient feeling that her life was a stupid affair. And deep in her
heart the sense of hurt and humiliation grew and spread; the thought
that she was not of the charmed circle of the Melroses, not secretly and
romantically akin to them, she was merely the casual object of the old
lady's fantastic sense of obligation. Aunt Kate, who had never said what
was untrue--who, Norma and her children firmly believed, could not say
what was untrue--had taken away, once and for all, the veil of mystery
and romance that had wrapped Norma for three exciting years.

For Leslie, and Katrina, and Mary Bishop, perhaps, travel and the thrill
of foreign shores or European courts. But for Wolf Sheridan's wife, this
small, orderly, charming house on the edge of the New Jersey woods, and
the laundry to think of every Monday, and the two-days' ordering to
remember every Saturday, as long as the world went round!

For a few days Norma really suffered in spirit, then the natural healthy
current of her life reestablished itself, and she philosophically
determined to make the best of the matter. If she was not Aunt Annie's
daughter and Leslie's cousin, she was at least their friend. They--even
unsuspecting of any strange relationship--had always been kind to her.
And Aunt Marianna and Aunt Alice had been definitely affectionate, to
say nothing of Chris!

So one day, when she happened to be shopping in the wi