Page:To-morrow Morning (1927).pdf/206

 ful for her age, isn't she? Ninety-four, I understand. A dear little old lady"

I must love Joe enough to let him go.

She sat by her window all night, looking out at the falling snow, not seeing it. Hartley Harrison had told her what she must do, though he would never know. She opened her hands and let Joe go; she tore the hope of his return utterly out of her heart. Dawn showed her gray and old, wrapped in her rosy eiderdown. The tears that had swollen her eyes had been dry for hours. She sat there with no thought, just broken feeling, until the gate clicked behind Effa and Joe's bath water roared in the tub.

"Joe, do you think there's any chance of your getting married soon?" she asked him that night. "You see, I really am lonely, here by myself all day, and I was thinking I might take Aunt Sarah and Carrie in if I had the studio. They're going to give up housekeeping, anyway, and they're crazy to come here, and I'd love to have them; it would be such company for me. And then what they paid would help out so that you could keep your millions for starting in yourself, you and Evelyn. I don't want to hurry you, only it will have to be settled pretty soon, because they have an offer for the house."

He looked so happy he made her want to cry. Even his spectacles shone.