out a chaperone? That
you can go down town without having to report home at half-hour
intervals?"

"Well! Well! Well!" marveled Mrs. Milo. She walked to the window
before retorting further. Then, with a return to the old methods of
playing for sympathy, "And here I've thought that you were contented
and happy with me! But--it seems that your mother isn't enough."

The attempt failed. "Was your mother enough?" demanded Sue.

Mrs. Milo came strolling back. Was it possible that tactics invariably
efficacious in the past would utterly fail her today? She made a
second attempt. "But--but do you realize," she faltered, with what
seemed deep feeling; "--your father died when Wallace was so little.
If you hadn't helped me, how would I have gotten on? If you'd
married----"

"Couldn't I have helped you?"

"But I had Wallace so late. And I'd have been alone. What would I
have done without my daughter?"

Sue was regarding her steadily. "What did your mother do without you?
And when you die, where shall _I_ be?--Alone! Ah, you've seen the
pathos of your own situation!--But how about mine?" For a second time
in a single day, this was a changed Sue, unaccountably clear-visioned,
and plain of speech.

"Dear me!" cried her mother, mockingly. "Our eyes are open all of a
sudden!"

"Yes,--my eyes are open."

"Why not open your mouth?"

"Thank you for the suggestion. I shall. For twenty-five years, my
eyes have been shut. I've always said, 'My mother is sweet, and pious,
and kind. She's one of that lovely type that's passing.' (Thank
Heaven, the type _is_ passing!) If now and then you were a little
severe with me--oh, I've noticed it because people have sometimes
interfered, as Hattie did this morning--I've never minded at all. I've
said, 'Whatever I am, I owe to my mother. And what she does is right.'
Anything you said or did to me never made any difference in the
wonderful feeling I had about you--the feeling of love and belief. All
this time I've never once thought of rebelling. But what you said and
did to another--to her, a girl who needs kindness and sympathy, who's
never done you an intentional wrong----! Oh, you're not really gentle
and charitable! You're cruel, mother!"

"I am just."

"The right kind of a woman today gives other women a chance for their
lives--their happiness. That is real piety. She makes allowances.
She's slow to condemn."

"You don't have to tell me that loose st