Often have I marvelled at the passion for maternity that burns in Anastasia. Her eyes shine so tenderly on children, and she will stop to caress some little one so yearningly.
“By the way, have you ever noticed the child on the ground floor apartment?—a little one with hair the colour of honey.”
“Oh yes; she’s good friend of me. She is adorable. Oh how I love have childs like zat. She’s call Solonge. She’s belong Frosine.”
“Who’s Frosine?”
“She’s girl what sew all day. She work for the Bon Marché. It’s awfool how she have to work hard.”
“Poor woman!”
“Oh no; she’s very ’appy like that. She’s free, and she have Solonge. She sing all day when she sew. Oh, she have much of courage, much of merit, that girl.”
“But,” I say, “would you like to have a child like that?”
“Why not, if I can care well for it and it make me ’appy?”
“But—it wouldn’t be moral.”