She set rather indifferently about her practising that afternoon. It seemed to be no matter whether Chopin or Mendelssohn spoke to her soul; both were alike rendered with a cold brilliancy very far removed from her usual sympathetic interpretation. Her thoughts were far away, wandering amid scenes of her girlhood; a happy time, full of social enjoyment, of affectionate family intercourse, of freedom from care, from make-shifts, from the dishonor of debt; a dishonor that bore lightly upon May, with his belief in the future, but that was crushing to her sensitive nature. Idly her fingers wandered, swifter her thoughts flew, till all at once a sentence of homely wisdom from a modern novelist came into her mind: "Many women are struggling under the burden of money-saving when they had far rather spend their energies in money-getting." She arose impetuously, her eyes suddenly full of light. What had she been thinking of? There was a fund of unused wealth in her fine musical education, in her beautiful voice, a little impaired by hardships, but magnificent still. Here was the way out of all this mirage of poverty; with what she could earn by taking a class in Madame Cable's school combined with her husband's earnings, they could live with comparative ease and comfort. Oh, happiness, oh, relief! Laura's hat and cape were on in ten minutes and a car was taking her down-town to the dwelling of her old teacher, sure of a welcome and of aid. Madame had offered her this position five years ago, just after her graduation, but her mother would not hear of it. Now her mother was two thousand miles away, on a frontier post with Major McHenry, entirely ignorant of the state of affairs in her daughter's household. What a curiously elusive thing courage is! By the time Laura's finger was on the bell at Madame's door, her breath was coming in gasps, and while she waited in the lofty and handsomely furnished parlor for the coming of her old teacher, all the strength went out of her knees, so that she found it difficult to rise when that stately, self-possessed woman came in with a little silken rustle of skirts and extended hand. It is so hard to say outright to a friend, "Help me!" And yet, is not the opportunity of giving help and comfort one of the rewards of a successful life? Why do we distrust human goodness? It was the pride in Laura's nature that made her talk of everything else rather than the object of her call, that made her tongue falter and her cheek grow paler, when at length she brought herself to her task. But fate was not ill-disposed. It happened that Madame needed her services. She had come at an opportune moment, and in a few minutes the business was satisfactorily settled.