Under the Law

by Edwina Stanton Babcock

"People talk about training girls for the home," said Sard. She was standing close by him now. "Why don't they see that the World is our home? All our own separate little homes are just so many leaves and petals on the great World-Flower. It isn't enough to know how to run a little house with two floors and a bathroom and a kitchen," said the girl. "We must train our minds and our muscles to be ready to help anywhere; in foreign countries—to make homes in Hell, if need be."

It was said not recklessly or rantingly, but with a New Conviction, the conviction of clean, honest youth awake to the larger demand of the future and anxious not to be surprised or appalled, but to meet those demands. Shipman, something young and aching in his own breast, something that had not been touched for years, looked down upon the tawny head so close to his shoulder; he caught his breath, "Winged Victory," he murmured.

"What?" asked practical Sard.

For answer the lawyer growled, "Nothing." He wandered restlessly about pulling back the low screening maple branches, peering into the depths of the woods where low sunset bird notes sounded over the wild geraniums and the ferns sent out strange bracken scents.

"Miss Bogart, do you know the character of the swamps through this section? Are there quick-sands?"

The girl stared. "I don't know," then suddenly startled, "Why?"

"Just because,"—the man was listening intently—"H'm! Yes, that's your man Colter's voice. I thought I heard it once before. Do you suppose he needs us?" He looked smilingly at her, anxious not too greatly to disturb her. "Would Miss Minga take chances with a bog or whatever? She'd do almost any fool thing, wouldn't she?"

"Chances—Minga!" Sard laughed while she frowned. "That's all Minga ever takes—chances; her life is like a little patchwork quilt, full of queer little bright pieces that don't match." Now the girl herself listened, staring into her companion's face, noting its strength and grimness. "I—I like him, sort of," admitted Sard to herself. Aloud she said, "Why, that's funny; just now I thought I heard someone too, but it was down there," indicating the direction of the canoes that could be heard farther down the creek. The sound of the mandolins and ukuleles had stopped, but wrangling voices sounded from time to time and once more came the raucous screams that Shipman had noted earlier in the afternoon.

"That's Cinny," said Sard, frowning in good earnest. "Ugh!" said the girl irritatedly, "I wish she wouldn't be so queer. I wish——"

"What do you wish?" asked Shipman quietly. He had the quality of the man whom she had seen that first night at the organ builder's house, a quality of control and strength that a woman might lean on. Half unconsciously Sard did lean on it; a worried look had come over her face. "I feel responsible for Minga," she admitted, "for all of them; they're so queer, so almost horrid sometimes. I get fussed wondering how they'll turn out—they—they seem to have no Law."