Though Donald had never carried out that hare-brained threat of his, as to "dropping a hint" to Mary, his voice could scarcely have been missed amid the general feminine chorus. Indeed, everybody who possessed so much as a hint to her name, in those days, seemed to be dropping it to Mary. How far she minded her public unpopularity Mary did not say, but her mother's unwavering disapprobation she unquestionably took to heart. "Good women don't make mistakes of that sort," said Mrs. Wing, and was shaken by no argument. And now, as Mary bent to kiss this wrinkled and well-loved cheek, she was thinking that never in the world before had there opened such a gulf between two generations; and she wondered why life must be so hard. Later, Mrs. Wing sat for some time quite still, by her window, and her brooding look was not grandmotherly now, but motherly, which is different. For, of course, there was one person on earth to whom Mary could never seem truly the mature, advanced and dangerous young woman of Fights, Reforms and Careers. Through all her newnesses and strength, the mother's eyes yet held her as the tiny, helpless, clinging little scrap which she, a young girl then, had gone down to the gates of the world to bring in. VII The "line" of the new novel refused to come straight on the first attempt, or the second, and Charles had been compelled to leave his preliminary scenarios to ripen gradually in his head. In the intervals of intense plotting, he was tossing off short fictions; four such he had now tossed since the completion of "Bondwomen" had set him free. "Bondwomen" itself was in the hands of that discriminating house, Messrs. Blank and Finney, Judge Blenso having risen up early on the morning after the rejection to take it to the express office. Experience was now coming with a leap; but yesterday the first of Charles's new stories had been sent back by "Willcox's Monthly," with a mere printed form of refusal. This was the fiction about Dionysius, who, it may be remembered, had freed his eyes from the magic of sex and consequently cracked walnuts with a sort of splendid sadness. Such episodes staggered belief; but, in a strange way, they seemed to fan the fires of genius unrecognized. Hence it was without joy that Charles confronted after supper this evening a memorandum he had lately left for himself in the place where he left memoranda. It was brief, containing but a single word,--_Bridge_; and, coming on it unexpectedly, the author spoke but a single word, though a different one. No more than Mary Wing, of course, did he have evenings to fling this way and that, in mere idle frivolity. Why did people have this mania for playing cards, going to places, calling, all the time? Why the mad rage for doing things?