If any one, any young person, were to know what her thoughts were--the old lady smiled--she would say she had known no trouble in life, was shallow, did not understand the tragedy of things. Well, she had had her share of life; her troubles as well as the rest of them. She had been a very sensitive girl. When she married Mr. Valance, her husband, she had hardly known him,--for such was the custom in her day, that he should satisfy her parents of his affection rather than herself,--and when the day came to leave her father and mother and her four brothers and her sisters, to leave the house she had known since she was born, to leave her own virginal room, and go away with a strange, terrifying, fascinating man--why, it was like jumping into the sea without knowing how to swim. In those days young girls did not know, were scared. And yet everything had been all right. She loved Mr. Valance, her husband. No two could ever have been closer than she and he. And she smiled at the terror of her leaving the home. And before Barry was born--oh, the ghastly nights, the ghastly, ghastly nights, of lying awake and fearing, fearing, and the hideous unimaginable dreams! And the birth itself, the surge of pain like some cruel, driving knife, and strength ebbing in a fast flood! And came kind unconsciousness, and when she woke there was a sort of white peace in her, and the little dark-haired boy, by some beneficent magic, was on the nurse's broad lap. And the strange miracle of how she had forgotten all the pain so soon ... how little it seemed, how natural! And how ready she would have been again. A little daughter, she had thought--how nice it would be! But it was n't to be. And when Mr. Valance, her husband, had died, for her had come, she thought, the end of the world. Yet now all she could remember were the peace and trust in his quiet face, when all had gone. And into the room where she was alone with him there came the quiet message that all was well. And the hearts of people were so warm. The doctor himself, who had seen so many die one would have thought he would have become callous, was so unaffectedly kind. Even people one had thought were enemies--or not enemies but just careless of one--showed a warmth, an understanding. And she had thought it impossible for her ever to be on the world alone; but somewhence strength had come to her, and poise; and all the fears she had when Mr. Valance, her husband, was alive, were dead now, she a widow. Lonely and down in grief at times, but afraid never!