Ethel on her rounds. One day as she passed a laundry shop she spied
this sign in the window: "Fine linen respectfully treated." And Ethel
chuckled at the thought that she herself was treated like that. On the
whole it was rather pleasant, though, and she made the most of it. She
was being carefully "wholesome."

Now it was well along in June, time for the children to go to the
seashore, so she began to hunt for a place. At the traveller's bureaus
she visited she found the clerks more than ready to give advice by the
hour to this gracious young creature so stylishly clad. And she had
soon selected a quiet little resort in Rhode Island.

But what was Joe doing all this time? She did not mean to keep prying,
but for the life of her she could not help throwing out casual
inquiries. His reply was always, "Business"; and he would go on to give
her details--all of which were tiresome. How much was he seeing of
Fanny Carr and her detestable money affairs? His manner, engrossed as
it had grown, and even irritable at times, made Ethel feel he was
putting her further and further out of that part of his existence which
now interested him most, the part that lay outside his home. Was it all
business, all of it? "And when I go to the seashore, he'll be here five
nights a week!" Sometimes he came in so late at night! Business? At
such an hour? "Now carefully, carefully, Ethel Lanier." But in spite of
herself the smiling words of young Mrs. Grewe recurred to her mind:
"Most of them are married men."

Ethel's doubts, however, were all ended late one night, when at the
sound of his key in the door she got out of bed and came into the
doorway of her room. Joe was standing in the hall. He did not see her.
In fact, his eyes, when he switched on the light, seemed to see nothing
in the world but the package of business papers he took from his
overcoat. His face was haggard but intent. He turned and went into his
study to work. And any suspicion of Fanny Carr, or of any other friend
of Joe's, was swept at once from Ethel's mind. Her rival was his
business.

And later at the seashore, where she had so many hours alone, she
thought about this work of his with deepening hostility. Her mind went
back into the past. How his office had always absorbed him. What a
refuge it had been in the months that followed Amy's death. "I wasn't
the one who first made him forget. Oh, no, it was his business!" And
now, as it had weaned him once from his grief