Behind it, the sinister cause of it
all, she thought confusedly now and then of the Great Death across the sea,
of the armies, smoking battle-fields, the shrieks of the dying, the
villages blazing, the women and children flying away. But never for more
than a moment. The war was so remote and dim. And soon she would turn back
again to her own beloved children, whose lives, so full of happiness, so
rich in promise hitherto, were now so cramped and thwarted. Each day was
harder than the last. It was becoming unbearable!
No, they must go back to school. But how to manage it? How? How? It would
cost eight hundred dollars, and this would take nearly all the money she
would be able to secure by the sale of her few possessions. And then what?
What of sickness, and the other contingencies which still lay ahead of her?
How old her father seemed, these days! In his heavy shock of hair the
flecks of white had doubled in size, were merging one into the other, and
his tall, stooping, massive frame had lost its look of ruggedness. Suppose,
suppose.... Her breath came fast. Was his life insured, she wondered.
On such afternoons, in the upstairs room as the dusk crept in and
deepened, she would bend close to her sewing--planning, planning, planning.
At last she would hear the children trooping merrily into the house. And
making a very real effort, which at times was in truth heroic, to smile,
she would rise and light the gas, would welcome them gaily and join in
their chatter and bustle about on the countless tasks of washing them,
getting their suppers, undressing the small ones and hearing their prayers.
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