Nona knew it was the answer that her mother awaited. She knew that nothing frightened and disorganized Pauline as much as direct contact with physical or moral suffering--especially physical. Her whole life (if one chose to look at it from a certain angle) had been a long uninterrupted struggle against the encroachment of every form of pain. The first step, always, was to conjure it, bribe it away, by every possible expenditure--except of one's self. Cheques, surgeons, nurses, private rooms in hospitals, X-rays, radium, whatever was most costly and up-to-date in the dreadful art of healing--that was her first and strongest line of protection; behind it came such lesser works as rest-cures, change of air, a seaside holiday, a whole new set of teeth, pink silk bed-spreads, lace cushions, stacks of picture papers, and hot-house grapes and long-stemmed roses from Cedarledge. Behind these again were the final, the verbal defenses, made of such phrases as: "If I thought I could do the least good"--"If I didn't feel it might simply upset her"--"_Some_ doctors still consider it contagious"--with the inevitable summing-up: "The fewer people she sees the better..." Nona knew that this attitude was not caused by lack of physical courage. Had Pauline been a pioneer's wife, and seen her family stricken down by disease in the wilderness, she would have nursed them fearlessly; but all her life she had been used to buying off suffering with money, or denying its existence with words, and her moral muscles had become so atrophied that only some great shock would restore their natural strength... "Great shock! People like mother never have great shocks," Nona mused, looking at the dauntless profile, the crisply waving hair, reflected in the toilet-mirror. "Unless I were to give her one ..." she added with an inward smile. Mrs. Manford restored her powder-puff to its crystal box. "Do you know, darling, I believe I'll go to town with you tomorrow. It was very brave of Maisie to make the effort of coming here the other day, but of course, I didn't like to burden her with too many details at such a time (when's the operation--tomorrow?), and there are things I could perfectly well attend to myself, without bothering her; without her even knowing. Yes; I'll motor up with you early." "She'll always delegate her anxieties," Nona mused, not unenviously, as Cécile slipped Mrs. Manford's spangled teagown over her firm white shoulders. Pauline turned a tender smile on her daughter. "It's so like you, Nona, to want to be with Maisie for the operation--so _fine_, dear."