The doctor set the broken hip and announced that he would be confined to his bed for many weeks. Mimi stayed as long as she felt she was needed, she did not want Mrs. Manning to feel she would desert her when her services were needed. But she located a boarding place, arranged for Petit Jean to stay by day at a nursery, and secured work sewing by the day through scanning the want ads and inquiry through the Mannings and one of their friends. The elderly couple objected to her going but they were not adroit enough in concealing their feelings to keep from her a note of relief. …
Month after month of the drab life rolled by. At her new home Mimi realized now how kind the Mannings had really been to her. Not that her new landlady was unkind. She too was good in her way, but lacking in understanding, in sympathy. Because her income was uncertain and she knew there would be days when she would have no work, Mimi had taken a place where she could obtain lodging at the lowest figure possible and at the same time secure respectability. Early in the morning she rose, gave Jean his bath and dressed him, prepared his breakfast and her own, took him to the nursery and went to her work. Returning in the evening, she brought him home, prepared him for bed, got her dinner and soon afterwards retired. This regular schedule was broken only by the all-too-frequent days when she had no work. The one bright spot in the week was Sunday, when she kept Jean with her and took him for short walks. She gave up attendance at church, for she was envious of anything which took her away from Jean.
Of social life or recreation there was none for her. She could not afford to spend money for even moving-picture shows. She occasionally visited the Mannings, telling them glowing accounts of the ease with which she was meeting her new life, telling these little falsehoods so convincingly that they in their innocence believed her. Mr. Manning was slowly getting better but his age was against him, his bones did not knit as rapidly as they had hoped. Always they asked Mimi when she would