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 rising starry with hope and fear from the dark kneeling circle.

"After all, what career is as great as motherhood?" she asked Boyd Benjamin, who had dropped in for a whisky and soda and to deplore this handicap to Christabel's career.

"I knew it! I knew when you married uptown and got prosperous that you'd go Victorian, too."

"Victoria didn't invent having babies."

"Specious," said Boyd, screwing a cigarette into a foot-long holder.

"To give life isn't a little thing, Boyd; it's a very beautiful and wonderful privilege," Christabel said, gently, and she thought, Frustration! That's what it is. Frustration and subconscious jealousy. Poor old Boyd! Then, as Boyd continued to scowl and puff, regardless of Christabel's hand waving away the smoke or pressing a handkerchief to her nose, she added:

"Boyd darling, would you mind not smoking? I hate to stop you, but one gets silly when one's not very strong"