a certain amount of quaint amusement to envy the ladies in their
carriages and motor-cars. The envy was not malicious. You would have
found no socialistic tendencies in her. In her mind, utterly
untutored in the sense of logic, she found birth to be a full and
sufficient reason for possession. But there was always alive in her
consciousness the orderly desire to also be a possessor herself. It
never led her actually into a definite discontent with her own
conditions of life, irksome, wearying, exhausting though she found
them to be. But subconsciously within her was the feeling that she
was not really meant to be denied the joy of luxuries. That instinct
showed itself in many little ways. She was sometimes
extravagant--bought a silk petticoat when a cotton one would have
done just as well, but, oh heavens! it was cheap! You would scarcely
have thought it possible to buy silk petticoats at the price. And
no doubt the appearance of the silk was only superficial. But it gave
her a great deal of pleasure. When any lady stepped down from her
carriage to go into one of those West End shops, Sally always noticed
the petticoat that she wore. Women will--men too, perhaps.

But on this dismal evening, when whenever she lifted her head the
fine rain sprayed upon her face, there was no pleasure to be found
in watching the people in the streets below. Carriages were huddled
up in line upon the stands and the coachmen shivered miserably on
their seats, the rain dripping in steady drops from the brims of their
hats into the laps of their mackintoshes. So she kept her head down,
and when she heard footsteps mounting the stairway, approaching her,
she held out the three coppers for her fare without looking up. When
her mind, anticipating the answering ring of the conductor's
ticket-puncher, realized the mistake, she raised her head, then
twisted back, electrically, as though some current had been passed