“She stopped and wiped the tears from her eyes.
“'Say, I felt as if I had been hit with an axe. My husband said:
“'Well, Baby, I guess they don't want us. Don't you mind. We'll have a good Christinas dinner here at the hotel and then we'll go and spend a month in New York.”
“'I stopped traveling and went to thinking. Poor Mr. Horton didn't live long. Now he's gone an' I haven't anybody. No, my daughtah does not care for me. Her ol' nurse lives with her—an ignorant French woman. I offered to work hard if she would send that nurse away an' take me to live with her. She wouldn't do it—no, suh! She loves that nurse an' doesn't care for me—not the snap of her fingah. I have been trying to get a chance to work for the Red Cross. My money is about gone. They say money talks but all it evah says to me is “good-by.” My daughtah's husband has offered me a small allowance, but I will not take their money—no, suh! One wants affection from her daughtah—not charily! Lordy! what a world it is an' what fools we are!'
“'You've been playing ever since you were a little girl, and you're tired.'
“'Yes, I'm tired. I remember how my big brother used to come an' plague me an' break my toys. That is what Death has been doing to me. Wouldn't let me alone. I reckon he saw how foolish I was. I've seen about everything but I think the grandest sight in the world would be some one who was glad to see me. You can't make friends an' be always on the move.'
“I suppose she had come back to Paris to comb the beach for another wreck. But her beauty was gone—so was her occupation of Baby.
“Often, I wonder just how the story is to end—the story of that pathetic woman who was reaping what she had sown—the harvest of the childless mother.
“Well, anyhow, at last, common sense had landed in her intellect. She had never given it a chance before. Hadn't stood still long enough.”