Page:The Art of Helping People Out of Trouble (1924).pdf/164

 whole experience as a reflection upon her ability to direct her own affairs, and they proceeded to manage them for her. They instituted a system of chaperonage and supervision which would have been irksome to a child, but the very man with whom, because he was married, Mrs. Darnell's relatives thought she was safe, became the means of her seduction.

Mrs. Darnell left her home and went to another city where her baby was born. Inasmuch as marriage with the father of the child was impossible, she decided that she would try to make a home for herself and the baby. The only means was a place at service. No one in all her relationship had ever earned a living in this way, and when the members of the family learned about it, they felt that they had been doubly disgraced. Mrs. Darnell's uncle hastened to call upon the social case worker to whom she had turned for advice.

"This must all stop," he announced. "We have everything planned for Edith. She is to come back home where we will take care of her. We'll place the baby in an institution and nobody need know that anything has happened."

Then he asked the social worker to persuade Mrs. Darnell to give up her plan and adopt the