A year ago she had prevailed upon her parents to take an apartment, for the old, brown-porched house in which she had been brought up had been almost intolerably shabby. It had seemed a very fine change to Fliss at first. She liked the nouveau art touches in the apartment living-room, the frescoed grapes in the dining-room, the mirrored door of the small, inconvenient bathroom. But the glamour had largely gone by this time. And to-night it was rather more faded than usual. To drive up to the apartment house door in some one’s limousine was not so bad. To walk down the stupid street by which she must approach the house was different. It was depressing. Fliss, who seldom knew depression, had the visible lines of it around her mouth as she pushed open the door of the tiny hall and smelled the frying grease of the lamb chops in the kitchen. She stood before the hall mirror, taking off her hat and putting it away carefully, hanging her suit coat up carefully too, with the fur draped over it. Her mother came in to watch her. “Did you have a good time, dearie?” “As good as I expected.” The girl’s tone was rather pathetically tired. “Any one bring you home?” “No, I walked--for exercise.” Her mother heard no sarcasm. “It’s a nice night out,” she said. “I just came in myself. I went to the White Sale at Barney’s and then dropped in at the Majestic--Dorothy Danby in ‘Other Men’s Wives,’ you know. It wasn’t very good--not worth a quarter.” Fliss must have had a swift vision of the women who did not go to see Dorothy Danby--of Mrs. Warner dealing at long range with her dinner parties. Her face was dark and bitter. “I hate this not being anybody--why aren’t we somebody?” she broke out. Her mother looked daunted. “I’m sure you go everywhere you want to--going to stay at the Spragues’ to-morrow night, out all this afternoon, and there’s that swell dance at the Mortons’ next week--I think you have a good time. It’s not my fault your father hasn’t more money.” “It’s nobody’s fault--nothing is. But that doesn’t make it easier. A girl can’t do it all alone--she needs houses, automobiles, if she is to get anywhere.” She stopped and looked at the stupid figure in front of her, which could not seem to understand its own failure as a mother. “It’s just that I’m tired and I think I’m getting a cold and it’s so darn lonesome with all the girls away. That musicale was the deadest thing you ever saw.” She went to the kitchen and watched the chops sizzling, drearily, but none the less with a certain interest. After all, the walk home had been exercise. CHAPTER V