.

"Ugh!" Rosie gasped, and Janet, who had struck a match and was reaching
for a candle, paused to say, over her shoulder: "If you want me to,
I'll shut his door."

Rosie would have liked nothing better but a humanitarian consideration
restrained her. "Wouldn't he smother in there with the door shut?"

"Maybe he would."

Janet spoke so indifferently that Rosie felt that she herself must bear
the whole burden of responsibility.

"Guess you had better leave it as it is, Janet. I suppose I'll be able
to stand it once I get used to it."

Rosie said this, but in her own mind she was perfectly sure she could
never sleep in such an atmosphere. She repeated this to herself many
times and very emphatically, while she was undressing and afterwards
when she was in bed.

"If you're careful," Janet instructed her, "and lie over just a little
bit near the edge, you won't hit the broken spring. Now good-night,
dear, and sleep tight."

Sleep tight, indeed, with that brute in there snorting like an engine
and one's back nearly broken in two stretching over sharp peaks and
yawning precipices! My! what would Rosie not have given to be at home in
her own bed! Not that her own bed was any marvel of comfort. It was not.
But it was her own--that was the great thing. People like their own
things--their own beds, their own homes, their own families. How Rosie
loved hers! There was her father for whom her heart overflowed in a
sudden gush of tenderness. Jamie O'Brien was so quiet and unobtrusive
that Rosie often forgot him. It needed the contrast of a Dave McFadden
to awaken in her a realization of his gentle worth. And, if you only
knew it, there wasn't a more generous-hearted soul on earth than Maggie
O'Brien. And where was there a prettier or a sweeter baby than
Geraldine? And Jackie was a nice kid, too. He was! And Terry---- Terry's
nobility of character could only be expressed orally with a sigh,
graphically with a dash.... Of course there was Ellen.... I suppose
every family has to have at least one disagreeable member.... Wouldn't
it be a great idea if all families just bunched together their
disagreeable members and sent 'em off somewhere alone where they
wouldn't be of any further nuisance? To the Great American Desert, for
instance! To such a scheme Rosie would gladly contribute Ellen and Janet
might contribute her father. The longer Rosie considered the plan, the
more sensible it seemed to her. She was surprised she hadn't t