"I'm glad you're coming round to my view, Selma. Only I deny the ability
of the free-born American, with the overflowing purse, to indulge his
newly acquired taste for gorgeous effects without professional
assistance."

"I suppose so. I can see that their house is crude, though I do think
that they have some handsome things. It must be interesting to walk
through shops and say: 'I'll take that,' just because it pleases you."

During her first marriage Selma had found the problem of dollars and
cents a simple one. The income of Lewis Babcock was always larger than
the demands made upon it, and though she kept house and was familiar
with the domestic disbursements, questions of expenditure solved
themselves readily. She had never been obliged to ask herself whether
they could afford this or that outlay. Her husband had been only too
eager to give her anything she desired. Consideration of the cost of
things had seemed to her beneath her notice, and as the concern of the
providing man rather than the thoughtful American wife and mother. After
she had been divorced the difficulty in supplying herself readily with
money had been a dismaying incident of her single life. Dismaying
because it had seemed to her a limitation unworthy of her aspirations
and abilities. She had married Littleton because she believed him her
ideal of what a man should be, but she had been glad that he would be
able to support her and exempt her from the necessity of asking what
things cost.

By the end of their first year and a half of marriage, Selma realized
that this necessity still stood, almost like a wolf at the door, between
her and the free development of her desires and aspirations. New York
prices were appalling; the demands of life in New York still more so.
They had started house-keeping on a more elaborate scale than she had
been used to in Benham. As Mrs. Babcock she had kept one hired girl; but
in her new kitchen there were two servants, in deference to the desire
of Littleton, who did not wish her to perform the manual work of the
establishment. Men rarely appreciate in advance to the full extent the
extra cost of married life, and Littleton, though intending to be
prudent, found his bills larger than he had expected. He was able to pay
them promptly and without worry, but he was obliged to make evident to
Selma that the margin over and above their carefully considered expenses
was very small. The task of watching the butcher's bo