to be a writer, and the brain of gold his ideas. It made me feel quite
uneasy to think that Henry, too, might be, metaphorically speaking,
steadily divesting himself of brain day by day in order to support The
Kid and me in comfort.

'I ought not to grumble,' he said at last. 'Very few people can do
what they want to in this world. Take you, my dear, for instance. You
are not following your natural bent when you write those articles for
the Woman's Page.'

'I should hope not--I loathe 'em,' I said viciously.

'There's one thing about it,' he went on musingly, 'we'll see that The
Kid has every chance when she grows up.'

We are looking forward very much to the time when The Kid will be grown
up. Henry says he pictures her moving silently about the house, tall,
graceful, helpful, smoothing his brow when he is wearied, keeping his
papers in order, correcting his proofs and doing all his typing for
him. I, too, for my part, have visions of her taking all household
cares off my shoulders, mending, cooking, making my blouses and her own
clothes, and playing Beethoven to us in the evenings when our work is
done. In her spare time we anticipate that she will write books and
plays that will make her famous.

We have visions of these things, I repeat--generally when The Kid is in
bed asleep with her hands folded on her breast in a devotional
attitude, a cherubic smile on her lips. There are, however, other
times when I hope for nothing more exacting than the day to come when
she will keep herself clean.