Marietta's face altered. She drew back from the other woman. "Oh, Madeleine! you act as though--you were counting on Lydia's--" "No; I'm not. I used to think a lot of Lydia before she disgraced poor Paul's memory in this way! But you see it'll be easy to do, one way or the other. If she--if she doesn't--why, Marietta, you know Lydia! She never can hold out against you and George, the nearest she has in the world. I should think you'd feel awfully about what people are saying--her letting Ariadne be adopted in that scandalous way when she had brothers and sisters. I should think you'd feel like asserting yourselves. _I_ do, certainly! I'm just as near to Ariadne as you are! And I know George is perfectly furious about the whole business!" "But maybe the doctor won't let us go in, right in to her--" A long-cherished grudge rose to the surface in Mrs. Lowder's energetic reply: "Well, I guess this is one time when the high-and-mighty Dr. Melton'll have to be shoved on one side, and if necessary I'll do the shoving!" "You feel justified?" "Justified! I should think I do! Justified in keeping my brother's child out of the clutches of that--and if my husband and your brother together can't raise the cash and the pull to get Ariadne away from him, too, I miss my guess. They will; of course they will, or what's the use of having money when you go to law!" Marietta was silent. Madeleine took her lack of responsiveness as due to the resentment of a poor person to her remarks as to the value of wealth in a democracy. She frowned, regretting a false step, and went on conciliatorily: "Of course we're only doing what any decent family is bound to do--protecting the children. It's what Lydia herself would want if she were in her right mind." She fell silent now, restless, fidgeting about, picking up small objects and setting them down unseeingly, and occasionally going to the window to look out at the hot, rainy night. She was in mourning for Paul, and above her black draperies her face was now like marble. Mrs. Mortimer, also in black, sat in a determinedly passive silence. Finally, the younger woman broke out: "Oh, I'll go crazy if I just stay here! I'm going upstairs to see the nurse again." In an instant she was back, her face whiter than before. "It's a boy--alive, all right--half an hour ago. Would you think they'd let us sit here and never tell us--" Her voice changed. "A little boy--" She sat down. "How is Lydia?" asked Lydia's sister. "--a little boy," said Madeleine. She addressed the other woman peremptorily. "I want him! You can have Ariadne!" She flushed as she spoke, and added defiantly: "I know I always said I didn't want children!" "How is Lydia?" Marietta broke in with an angry impatience. "Very low, the nurse said; Dr. Melton wouldn't give any hope." Marietta's face twitched. Her large white hands clasped each other hard.