I had a sense of being caught in an inescapable net, prisoner of my own theories. If children of six were no longer tyrants, the possession of Ernest would not interfere with my work or my life. I had spoken confidently. I had a reputation among my friends of speaking eloquently about “the child.” And I always find it almost impossible to resist the offer of new experience. I hesitated and was lost. I even found myself naming the day for Ernest’s momentary adoption. And during all that week I found it increasingly impossible to forget him. The night before Ernest was to come I told myself that I could not believe that this perilous thing was about to happen to me. I made no preparations to receive Ernest in my tiny bachelor apartment. I felt that I was in the hands of fate. II I was not really surprised when fate knocked at the door next morning in the person of my grinning friend, and swiftly left a well-bundled little boy with me. I have rarely seen a young woman look as maliciously happy as did his guide when she left, with the remark that she couldn’t possibly come for Ernest that evening, but would take him at nine o’clock on the morrow. My first quick resentment was stilled by the thought that perhaps an official day was a day plus a night. But Ernest loomed formidably at me. There would be problems of sleeping. Was I a victim? Well, that is what parents were! They should not find me weak. Ernest expressed no aversion to staying with me. He was cheerful, a little embarrassed, incurious. The removal of his hat disclosed a Dutch-cut of yellow hair, blue eyes, many little freckles, and an expression of slightly quizzical good-humor. I really had not had the least conception how big a boy of six was likely to be, and I found comfort in the evidence that he was big enough to be self-regulating, and yet deliciously small enough to be watched over. He could be played with, and without danger of breaking him. Ernest sat passively on a chair and surveyed the room. I had thought a little pedantically of exposing him to some Montessori apparatus. I had got nothing, however. The room suddenly became very inane; the piano a huge packing-box, the bookcases offensive, idiotic shelves. A silly room to live in! A room practically useless for these new and major purposes of life. I was ashamed of my surroundings, for I felt that Ernest was surveying me with contempt and reproach.