She protested vigorously against his proposal. She was grateful, so grateful the tears stood in her eyes. But, following so closely upon her confession of poverty, it smacked too much of charity, and she would not, she could not permit that.
“Well, have it your own way,” he finally agreed. “But don’t hurry.”
She was touched by his kindness. He hurried away. When he was gone a dozen phrases of thanks came to her mind, vexing her that she had been too stunned by his generosity to think of them before he had gone. …
As if Fate felt ashamed of the blows it had dealt her, there came to Mimi several profitable jobs during the four weeks Jean was in the hospital. One of these lasted more than a week, the making of the trousseau of a girl who belonged to one of the old Philadelphia coloured families. She never knew that she had been recommended by Dr. Newton, but the money she earned enabled her to pay not only the hospital bill but to settle a part of the debt she owed Mrs. Williams. Now that Jean was out of danger and well on the road to recovery, Mimi worked with a song in her heart and happiness in the belief that her darkest days were past. And when he was returned from the hospital she bought little things for his amusement, toys, games, dainty bits of the foods he was allowed to eat. She was envious of everything which separated her from him even for a short time, she begrudged the hours they spent in sleep, for they robbed her, she felt, of so many moments of conscious knowledge of and contact with him.
The acuteness of her desire to be with Jean was rooted not alone in the to her more than miraculous escape he had had. It was, too, in the decision she had reached through that illness and the inevitability of