in him; all day long, in
the loneliness of their third-floor front, under the gaze of Daniel
Webster, she brooded over it. Even while she was reading magazines and
plodding through newspaper editorials on public questions she had never
heard of, so that she could find things to talk about to him, she was
thinking of the change, and asking herself what she had done--or left
undone--to cause it? She also asked him:

"Maurice! Something bothers you! I'm not enough for you. What _is_ the
matter?"

He said, shortly, "Nothing."

At which she retreated into the silence of hurt feelings. Once, she
knelt down, her face hidden on the grimy bed-spread, and prayed: "God,
_please_ give us a child--that will make him happy. And show me what to
do to please him! Show me! Oh, _show_ me! I'll do anything!" And who can
say that her prayer was not answered? For certainly an idea did spring
into her mind: those tiresome people downstairs--he liked to talk to
them;--to Miss Moore, who giggled, and tried, Eleanor thought, to seem
learned; and to the elderly woman who told stories. How could he enjoy
talking to them when he could talk to her? But he did. So, suppose she
tried to be more sociable with them? "I might invite Mrs. Davis to come
up to our room some evening--and I would sing for her? ... But not Miss
Moore; she is _too_ silly, with her jokes!" Her mind strained to find
ways to be friendly with these people he seemed to like. And
circumstances helped her....

That was the month of the great eclipse. For a week Miss Ladd's boarders
had talked about it, exchanging among themselves much newspaper
astronomical misinformation--which the learned Miss Moore good-naturedly
corrected. It was her suggestion that the household should make a night
of it: "Let's all go up on the roof and see the show!" So the friendly
gayety was planned--a supper in the basement dining room at half past
eleven--ginger ale! ice cream! chocolate! Then an adjournment _en masse_
to the top of the house. Of course Miss Moore, engineering the affair,
invited the Curtises, confident of a refusal--and an acceptance;--both
of which, indeed, she secured; but, to her astonishment, it was Mr.
Curtis who declined, and his wife who accepted.

"It's a bore," Maurice told Eleanor, listlessly.

She looked worried: "Oh, I am so sorry! I told them at luncheon that we
would come. I thought you'd enjoy it" (Her acceptance, which had been a
real sacrifice to her, was a bomb to