e. She settled herself into an easier
position, hollowing her arm to pillow the round downy head, and holding
her breath lest a sound should disturb the sleeping child.

As she lay there she said to herself that there was something she must
tell Selden, some word she had found that should make life clear between
them. She tried to repeat the word, which lingered vague and luminous on
the far edge of thought--she was afraid of not remembering it when she
woke; and if she could only remember it and say it to him, she felt that
everything would be well.

Slowly the thought of the word faded, and sleep began to enfold her. She
struggled faintly against it, feeling that she ought to keep awake on
account of the baby; but even this feeling was gradually lost in an
indistinct sense of drowsy peace, through which, of a sudden, a dark
flash of loneliness and terror tore its way.

She started up again, cold and trembling with the shock: for a moment she
seemed to have lost her hold of the child. But no--she was mistaken--the
tender pressure of its body was still close to hers: the recovered warmth
flowed through her once more, she yielded to it, sank into it, and slept.

Chapter 14

The next morning rose mild and bright, with a promise of summer in the
air. The sunlight slanted joyously down Lily's street, mellowed the
blistered house-front, gilded the paintless railings of the door-step,
and struck prismatic glories from the panes of her darkened window.

When such a day coincides with the inner mood there is intoxication in
its breath; and Selden, hastening along the street through the squalor of
its morning confidences, felt himself thrilling with a youthful sense of
adventure. He had cut loose from the familiar shores of habit, and
launched himself on uncharted seas of emotion; all the old tests and
measures were left behind, and his course was to be shaped by new stars.

That course, for the moment, led merely to Miss Bart's boarding-house;
but its shabby door-step had suddenly become the threshold of the
untried. As he approached he looked up at the triple row of windows,
wondering boyishly which one of them was hers. It was nine o'clock, and
the house, being tenanted by workers, already showed an awakened front to
the street. He remembered afterward having noticed that only one blind
was down. He noticed too that there was a pot of pansies on one of the
window sills, and at once concluded that the window must