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"Go, then, little Mary Alexina Blair," said the lady; "he's a little ingrate whose mother has to barter with him for every concession he makes her."

But she beamed now while Molly's low laughter rose softly. Alexina rearranged lights and adjusted decorations. She went out to the kitchen and took a reassuring survey. Later, she told the Aden youths who asked, she didn't believe she meant to dance. They did not press her; perhaps it was the gown, perhaps it was her manner preventing. She laughed, as if it mattered! She talked with Mr.

Perhaps not or I wouldn't be here to-day. At least I wouldn't be talking to you," she added, her voice hoarse with significance. Once more Alexina eyed the muff. "Did you come here to kill me?" "Yes, I did. No, I haven't a pistol. I couldn't get one. I trusted to opportunity. When I saw you standing at the edge of that hole I thought I had it."

Alexina knew that the times were bad and that her husband was having something of a struggle, and, as a dutiful wife, was anxious to help him out for the present, but it was simply beyond her powers of comprehension to grasp the fact that he was in no position to pay half the expenses of their small establishment.

Alexina darted across and into the shadows of the avenue that led up to her old-fashioned home, a relic of San Francisco's "early days," perched high on the steepest of the casual hills in that city of a hundred hills.

Her voice was deep and naturally abrupt but she achieved a fair imitation of Alexina's sweet cordiality. "It has meant quite as much to me, Alexina, I can assure you. And now that I am on my own and shall have a day or two between cases I know where I shall spend them. I am only too thankful that I graduated in time to take care of dear Mrs. Groome.

At first they hoped to be able to get something to do in Thorndale, so that they might keep their home. This proved impossible. After much discouragement and disappointment Stephen had secured a position in the lumber mill at Lessing, and Alexina was promised a place in a departmental store in the city. To make matters worse, Duncan Tracy and Stephen had quarrelled in October.

And if you weren't such a beauty, damn you! I'd hate you this minute as I hate your whole parasite class." "Oh, you are a socialist!" Alexina looked at him with frank curiosity. "I never saw one before." He was obviously disconcerted. Then his face flushed with anger. "Yes, I'm a socialist all right, and you'll see more of us before you're many years older."

And Alexina, who was prepared for a scolding, shrank a little, for it was the first time that her doting sister had spoken to her with severity. "I don't care," she said stubbornly, and she set her soft lips until they looked stern and hard. "But you must care. You are a Groome." "Oh, yes, and a Ballinger, and a Geary, and all the rest of it.

He never criticized his wife's clothes, but when they displeased him he ignored them with delicate ostentation. Alexina had begun to feel that she should scream in the complete silence of the dining-room when Mortimer unexpectedly made a remark. "Gora arrives to-morrow. Will you meet her? I shall not have time." "Of course. I shall be delighted to see her again.