They chatted over their tea, Mitty regaling her guest with the gossip of the day, of which she was full. They had been talking some time when the conversation turned on Mercedes and Jerry. It was the first time the subject had come up between them. Mitty knew part at least of her friend’s story, and she had tried to spare her, but she hated Mercedes, who had treated her with scornful indifference, and she hated Jerry because Barney did. She was glad now to give her candid opinion to the woman they had combined to hurt. “They said it was her health that was bad, and that was why she had to quit and go below. Health!” with a compressing of the corners of her mouth and a glance of sidelong meaning. “Her health’s all right; it was her temper.” “Temper!” said June faintly. “Uncle Jim said her throat was delicate and she had a cough.” “Cough!” snorted Mitty. “We all have coughs, but we don’t leave our husbands and go cavorting down to San Francisco to throw round money and pick up some other man. She didn’t care for him. That was all that was the matter. It’s a simple disease and a lot of ’em get it.” June silently stirred her tea. Every word pierced her, but she wanted to hear them. She had heard nothing of the separation, except the generally accepted story of Mercedes’ delicate health. Instinct told her that Mitty, the woman, had looked deeper and would know more of what had really been the case. Without speaking she raised her eyes from the cup and fixed them on the baby, who in an excess of affection was licking the face of the rubber rabbit. Mitty went on with complacent volubility: “Barney thought maybe it was a baby. He’s a simple, innocent sort of man, Barney Sullivan. But I said to him, ‘Don’t you fear, there won’t be any babies in that house! The Lord ain’t goin’ to make such a break as to give that woman a baby.’ I guess not,” said Mitty, folding her arms and looking grimly round the room as if challenging an unseen audience to contradict her. June returned to the stirring of her tea while her hostess continued, “No. She just hated Virginia. Nobody was standing round here to kiss her boots and do the doormat act. And she didn’t like Jerry well enough for him to make her stand it. You have to like a man a good deal to stay here in winter,”--in the tone of one who is forced to admit a melancholy fact. “If you don’t, you’re liable to pretend to get sick and have to go below for a spell. I’ve seen many of ’em go that way.” “Didn’t Jerry try to stop her?” said June in a low voice. “Try to stop her?”--with angry contempt--“not much! He didn’t _care_. Why, June Allen, he was glad, downright _glad_, I believe, to have her go. He don’t care for anything under the canopy but Jerry Barclay.” “He cared when he married her.” June’s voice was lower still and shook. Her friend noticed it and determined to sow seed, now she had the opportunity.