d. A scrap or two that reached her above the noise of the train
made her prick up her ears. She changed her seat so that she sat back to
back with Mrs. Ware and Mary. Eavesdropping on the train was perfectly
justifiable, she told her uneasy conscience, because there was no
personal element in it. Of course she couldn't do it at home, but it was
different among strangers. All the world was a stage when one travelled,
and the people one met on a journey were the actors one naturally looked
to to help pass the time. So she sat with her eyes closed, because
riding backward always made her dizzy, and her head so close to the back
of Mary's that the bronze quills would have touched her ear had Mary
turned an inch or two farther around in her seat.

Presently she gathered that this interesting young girl was about to go
out into the wide, wide world to make her fortune, and that she had a
list of teachers' agencies and employment bureaus to which she intended
applying as soon as she reached home. From various magazines given her
to read on the way, she had cut a number of advertisements which she
wanted to answer, but her mother objected to most of them. She did not
want her to take a place among strangers as governess, companion,
social secretary, mother's helper, reader for a clipping bureau or
shopping agent.

"You are too young, Mary," she insisted. "One never knows what one is
getting into in strange families. Now, that position in a Girls' Winter
Camp in Florida does not seem so objectionable, because they give
teachers at Warwick Hall as reference. You can easily find out all about
it. But there is no real reason why you should go away this winter. Now
that Jack has his position again and we are all well and strong we can
live like lords at Lone-Rock on his salary. At least," she added,
smiling, "it must seem like lords to some of the families in the camp.
And he can save a little each month besides."

"But, mother dear," answered Mary, a distressed frown puckering her
smooth forehead. "I don't want to settle down for Jack to take care of
me. I want to live my own life--to see something of the world. You let
Joyce go without objecting."

"Yes, to make an artist of herself. But somehow that was different. She
had a definite career mapped out. Her work is the very breath of life to
her, and it would have been wrong to hold her when she has such
undoubted talent. But you see, Mary, your goal is so vague. You haven't
an