Ruth switched off the light and went back to bed, better content. She felt that now Susan would stop her staring and would go to sleep. Sam's call had been very satisfactory. Ruth felt she had shown off to the best advantage, felt that he admired her, would come to see _her_ next time. And now that she had so arranged it that Susan would avoid him, everything would turn out as she wished. "I'll use Arthur to make him jealous after a while--and then--I'll have things my own way." As she fell asleep she was selecting the rooms Sam and she would occupy in the big Wright mansion--"when we're not in the East or in Europe." CHAPTER V RUTH had forgotten to close her shutters, so toward seven o'clock the light which had been beating against her eyelids for three hours succeeded in lifting them. She stretched herself and yawned noisily. Susan appeared in the connecting doorway. "Are you awake?" she said softly. "What time is it?" asked Ruth, too lazy to turn over and look at her clock. "Ten to seven." "Do close my shutters for me. I'll sleep an hour or two." She hazily made out the figure in the doorway. "You're dressed, aren't you?" she inquired sleepily. "Yes," replied Susan. "I've been waiting for you to wake." Something in the tone made Ruth forget about sleep and rub her fingers over her eyes to clear them for a view of her cousin. Susan seemed about as usual--perhaps a little serious, but then she had the habit of strange moods of seriousness. "What did you want?" said Ruth. Susan came into the room, sat at the foot of the bed--there was room, as the bed was long and Ruth short. "I want you to tell me what my mother did." "Did?" echoed Ruth feebly. "Did, to disgrace you and--me." "Oh, I couldn't explain--not in a few words. I'm so sleepy. Don't bother about it, Susan." And she thrust her head deeper into the pillow. "Close the shutters." "Then I'll have to ask Aunt Fanny--or Uncle George or everybody--till I find out." "But you mustn't do that," protested Ruth, flinging herself from left to right impatiently. "What is it you want to know?" "About my mother--and what she did. And why I have no father--why I'm not like you--and the other girls." "Oh--it's nothing. I can't explain. Don't bother about it. It's no use. It can't be helped. And it doesn't really matter." "I've been thinking," said Susan. "I understand a great many things I didn't know I'd noticed--ever since I was a baby. But what I don't understand----" She drew a long breath, a cautious breath, as if there were danger of awakening a pain. "What I don't understand is--why. And--you must tell me all about it. . . . Was my mother bad?" "Not exactly bad," Ruth answered uncertainly. "But she did one thing that was wicked--at least that a woman never can be forgiven for, if it's found out." "Did she--did she take something that didn't belong to her?"