Elizabeth, who was tired and bored, felt a sudden hope that this was the end, and she started up hopefully; but she found in Mrs. Russell’s beautiful face a quick smile of sympathy and patience. And Elizabeth was ashamed; she was sorry she had let Mrs. Russell see that she was weary of all this, and she felt a new dissatisfaction with herself. She told herself that she was utterly fickle and hopeless; she had entered upon this charity work with such enthusiasm, and here she was already tiring of it at the first meeting! Elizabeth looked at Mrs. Russell, and for a moment envied her her dignity and her tact and her patience, all of which must have come from her innate gentleness and kindness. The face of this woman, who presided so gracefully over this long, wearying session, was marked with lines of character, her brow was serene and calm under the perfectly white hair massed above it. The eyes were large, and they were sad, just as the mouth was sad, but there dwelt in the eyes always that same kindness and gentleness, that patience and consideration that gave Mrs. Russell her real distinction, her real indisputable claim to superiority. Elizabeth forgot her impatience and her weariness in a sudden speculation as to the cause of the sadness that lay somewhere in Mrs. Russell’s life. She had known ease and luxury always; she had been spared all contact with that world which Elizabeth was just beginning to discover beyond the confines of her own narrow and selfish world. Mrs. Russell surely never had known the physical hunger which now and then was at least officially recognized in this room where the bureau met; could there be a hunger of the soul which gave this look to the human face? Elizabeth Ward had not yet realized this hunger, she had not yet come into the full consciousness of life, and so it was that just at a moment, when she seemed very near to its recognition, she lost herself in the luxury of romanticizing some sorrow in Mrs. Russell’s life, some sorrow kept hidden from the world. Elizabeth thought she saw this sorrow in the faint smile that touched Mrs. Russell’s lips just then, as she gave a parliamentary recognition to another woman--a heavy, obtrusive woman who was rising to say: "Madame President."