regard to taste or desire. It was wonderful; but it was wearying in
spite of the delight, and so the little house was not all furnished in
a day.

"Well, the living-room's done, anyway, and the willow set for the
porch room!" sighed Leslie, leaning back with a fling of weariness.
"Now to-morrow we'll do the dining-room."

"To-morrow's Sunday, Les; the stores aren't open. Use your bean a
little, child."

"Sunday!"

Leslie's beautiful face drew itself into a snarl of impatience, the
first, really, that Julia Cloud had seen.

"Oh, darn!" said Leslie's pretty lips. "Isn't that too horrid? I
forgot all about it. I wonder what they have to have Sunday for,
anyway. It's just a dull old bore!"

"O Leslie, darling!" said Julia Cloud, aghast, something in her heart
growing suddenly heavy and sinking her down, down, so that she felt as
if she could hardly hold her head up another minute.

"Well, Cloudy, dear, don't you think it's a bore yourself, truly?
Come, now, own up. And I'm sure I don't see what's the use of it, do
you? One can't do a thing that's nice. But I'll tell you what we can
do!" her eyes growing bright with eagerness again. "We'll measure and
cut all the curtains, and turn the hems up. And, Allison, you can put
up the fixtures. If only the machine could have been sent up to-day,
we could have had the curtains all done, couldn't we, Cloudy?"

But Julia Cloud's lips were white and trembling, and her sweet eyes
had suddenly gone dark with trouble and apprehension.

"O Leslie, darling child!" she gasped again. "You don't mean you would
work on the Sabbath day!"

"Why, why not, Cloudy, dear? Is there anything wrong about that?"

CHAPTER XI

Julia Cloud had a sudden feeling that everything was whirling beneath
her--the very foundations of the earth. She drew a deep breath,
and tried to steady herself, thinking in her heart that she must be
very calm and not make any mistakes in this great crisis that had
arisen. It flashed across her consciousness that she was a simple,
old-fashioned woman, accustomed to old-fashioned ideas, living all
her life in a little town where the line between the church and the
world was strongly marked, where the traditions of Christianity were
still held sacred in the hearts of many and where the customs of
worldliness had not yet noticeably invaded. All the articles she had
read in the religious press about the worldliness of the modern
Sabbath, the terrible desecration