prove so long as they remained together--that for both a separation
was desirable--that she had recommended sending the child into the
country, where it would be better cared for than it could be at home
with Katy constantly undoing all Mrs. Kirby had done, disregarding her
orders, waking it from sleep whenever the fancy took her, and in short
treating it much as she probably did her doll when she was a little
girl. With the child away there would be nothing to prevent Katy's going
out as she used to do, and getting back her good looks, which were
somewhat impaired.

"Why, she looks older than you do," Wilford said, thinking thus to
conciliate Helen, who quietly replied:

"There is not two years difference between us, and I have always been
well, keeping regular hours until I came here."

Wilford's compliment had failed, and more annoyed than before, he asked,
not what Helen thought of the arrangement, but if she would influence
Katy to act and think rationally upon it; "at least you will not make it
worse," he said, and this time there was something quite deferential and
pleading in his manner.

Helen knew the matter was fixed, that neither Katy's tears nor
entreaties would avail to revoke the decision, and so, though her whole
soul rose in indignation against a man who would deliberately send his
nursing baby from his roof because it was in his way, and was robbing
his bride's cheek of its girlish bloom, she answered composedly:

"I will do what I can, but I must confess it seems to me an unnatural
thing. I had supposed parents less selfish than that."

Wilford did not care what Helen had supposed, and her opposition only
made him more resolved. Still he did not say so, and he even tried to
smile as he quitted the table and remarked to her:

"I hope to find Katy reconciled when I come home. I think I had better
not go up to her again, so tell her I send a good-by kiss by you. I
leave her case in your hands."

It was a far more difficult case than either he or Helen imagined, and
the latter started back in alarm from the white face which greeted her
view as she entered Katy's room, and then with a moan hid itself in the
pillow.

"Wilford thought he had better not come up, but he sent a kiss by me,"
Helen said, softly touching the bright, disordered hair, all she could
see of her sister.

"It does not matter," Katy gasped. "Kisses cannot help me if they take
my baby away. Did he tell you?" and she turned now