clad children beside her, thus had the world to face, at thirty-
four. George, the first-born, destined to die in his twentieth
summer, was eighteen then, Mary Lou sixteen, helpless and feminine,
and Alfred, at thirteen, already showed indications of being
entirely spoiled. Then came conscientious, gentle little Virginia,
ten years old, and finally Georgianna, who was eight.

Out of the general wreckage, the Fulton Street house was saved, and
to the Fulton Street house the spoiled, terrified little family
moved. Mary Lou sometimes told Susan with mournful pride of the
weeping and wailing of those days, of dear George's first job, that,
with the check that Ma's uncle in Albany sent every month, supported
the family. Then the uncle died, and George died, and Ma, shaken
from her silent and dignified retirement, rose to the occasion in a
manner that Mary Lou always regarded as miraculous, and filled the
house with boarders. And enjoyed the new venture thoroughly, too,
although Mary Lou never suspected that. Perhaps Ma, herself, did not
realize how much she liked to bustle and toil, how gratifying the
stir and confusion in the house were, after the silent want and
loneliness. Ma always spoke of women in business as unfortunate and
hardened; she never spoke of her livelihood as anything but a
temporary arrangement, never made out a bill in her life. Upon her
first boarders, indeed, she took great pride in lavishing more than
the luxuries for which their board money could possibly pay. Ma
reminded them that she had no rent to pay, and that the girls would
soon be married, and Alfie working.

But Papa had been dead for twenty years now, and still the girls
were unmarried, and Alfred, if he was working, was doing it in so
fitful and so casual a manner as to be much more of a burden than a