Later, in a few days, I just finished up with Masha and Mendel and Frieda and Sonya to send them to school, and I was getting Aby ready for kindergarten, when I hear a knock on the door, and a lady comes in. She had a white starched dress like a nurse and carried a black satchel in her hand. “I am from the Social Betterment Society,” she tells me. “You want to go to the country?” Before I could say something, she goes over to the baby and pulls out the rubber nipple from her mouth, and to me, she says, “You must not get the child used to sucking this; it is very unsanitary.” “Gott im Himmel!” I beg the lady. “Please don’t begin with that child, or she’ll holler my head off. She must have the nipple. I’m too nervous to hear her scream like that.” When I put the nipple back again in the baby’s mouth, the lady takes herself a seat, and then takes out a big black book from her satchel. Then she begins to question me. What is my first name? How old I am? From where come I? How long I’m already in this country? Do I keep any boarders? What is my husband’s first name? How old he is? How long he is in this country? By what trade he works? How much wages he gets for a week? How much money do I spend out for rent? How old are the children, and everything about them. “My goodness!” I cry out. “For why is it necessary all this to know? For why must I tell you all my business? What difference does it make already if I keep boarders, or I don’t keep boarders? If Masha had the whooping-cough or Sonya had the measles? Or whether I spend out for my rent ten dollars or twenty? Or whether I come from Schnipishock or Kovner Gubernie?” “We must make a record of all the applicants, and investigate each case,” she tells me. “There are so many who apply to the charities, we can help only those who are most worthy.” “Charities!” I scream out. “Ain’t the charities those who help the beggars out? I ain’t no beggar. I’m not asking for no charity. My husband, he works.” “Miss Holcomb, the visiting teacher, said that you wanted to go to the country, and I had to make out this report before investigating your case.” “Oh! Oh!” I choke and bit my lips. “Is the free country from which Miss Holcomb told me, is it from the charities? She was telling me some kind people made arrangements for any mother what needs to go there.” “If your application is approved, you will be notified,” she says to me, and out she goes. When she is gone I think to myself, I’d better knock out from my head this idea about the country. For so long I lived, I didn’t know nothing about the charities. For why should I come down among the beggars now?