better than those dollar coats, and such really fine material, that I bought it!"
Here there should be a deeply impressive scene, everybody embracing everybody else amid the glad cries of Sara, but instead Sara's lip quivered. Tears slid down her cheeks.
"Thank you," she murmured in a trembling voice.
"Why, Sara, what's the matter?" cried her grandmother. "What ails you? Don't you like the coat?"
Sara could not speak. She slipped down on the floor and put her face in her mother's lap, holding the coat aloft. She made a violent effort, knowing how kind her grandmother had meant to be. From the depths of the desire of her aching mother heart quivered the words, "What's Georgiana going to do? What's Georgiana going to do? What's Georgiana going to do all winter?"
Justice decreed that the richer Georgiana should suffer. The coats, and two coats alone, would have fulfilled the impassioned desired of the maternal heart of Sara. She could not explain. She had no words. But since she had one naked and cold offspring she had also a mother's broken heart.
There had to be some way out of the difficulty. Life would otherwise have been too cruel. Alice came into the nursery to hear Sara talking to the Unseen.
"Evelyn," Sara was calling cautiously, "Evelyn Dearie."
"I thought Evelyn Dearie was dead and buried?" Alice protested.
"I've undeaded her. She isn't dead any more. She said, 'Sara, I'd better come back. I'm better'n Georgiana. I don't worry so. I don't wear clothes!'"
What could Alice answer? The day had been too hard, and besides, there are few ways of outwitting the tyranny of the maternal instinct.
