"Well, I am ashamed of myself, but I am telling the truth. I don't see the use in pretending any more about it. I love her just as much, but anyone with half an eye can see it. I think what we must do is to face it and then tactfully manage her." Douglas and Helen could not help laughing at Nan. "You see," she continued, "it is up to us to support the family somehow and make mumsy comfortable and keep her from telling father that she hasn't got all she wants. Of course she can't have all she wants, but she can be warm and fed at least." "But, Nan, it isn't up to you to support the family," said Douglas. "You must go back to school, you and Lucy." "Well, it is up to me to spend just as little money as possible and to earn some if I can. I am not going to be a burden on you and Helen. You needn't think it." "We'll have the one hundred from the rent of the house and then Helen and I shall have to find jobs. What, I don't know." "Well, I, for one, can't find a job until I get some new clothes," declared Helen. "I haven't a thing that is not hopelessly out of style." "Can't your last winter's suit be done over? Mine can." "Now, Douglas, what's the use in going around looking like a frump? I think we should all of us get some new clothes and then waltz in and get good jobs on the strength of them. If I were employing girls I should certainly choose the ones who look the best." Douglas shook her head sadly. Helen was Helen and there was no making her over. She would have to learn her lesson herself and there was no teaching her. "Dr. Wright says we must keep father out of the city this winter but we need not be in the dead country. We can get a little house on the edge of town so Nan and Lucy can go in to school. I think we can get along on the rent from the house if you and I can make something besides." When the question of where they were to live for the winter was broached to Mrs. Carter, she was taken quite ill and had to stay in bed a whole day. "No one considers me at all," she whimpered to Nan, who had brought her a tray with some tea and toast for her luncheon. "Just because you and Douglas like the country you think it is all right. I am sure I shall die in some nasty little frame cottage in the suburbs. It is ridiculous that we cannot turn those wretched people out of my house and let me go back and live in it again." "But, mumsy," soothed Nan, "we are going to make you very comfortable and we will find a pretty house and maybe it will be brick." "But to dump me down in the suburbs when I have had to be away from society for all these months as it is! I am sure if I could talk it over with your father he would agree with me--but you girls even coerce me in what I shall and shall not say to my own husband. I do not intend to submit to it any longer." "Oh, mother, please--please don't tell father. Dr. Wright says----"