Katie was not sorry, for it turned Mrs. Prescott from Ann.  Like the football player who has lost his wind, she wanted a little time counted out.

But she soon found that she was not playing anything so kindly as a game of hard and fast rules.

It seemed at first that Ann’s ride had done her good.  She seemed to have relaxed and did not give Katie that sense of something smoldering within her.  Katie sat beside her, an arm thrown lightly about Ann’s shoulders—­lightly but guardingly.

Neither of them talked much.  Mrs. Prescott and Mrs. Leonard were “visiting”; the men talking of some affairs of Mr. Osborne’s.  He was commending the army for minding its own business—­not “butting in” and trying to ruin business the way some other departments of the Government did.  The army seemed in high favor with Mr. Osborne.

Suddenly Mrs. Leonard turned to Katie.  She was a large woman, poised by the shallow serenity of self-approval.

“I do feel so sorry for Miss Osborne,” she said.  “Such a shocking thing has occurred.  One of the girls at the candy factory—­you know she’s trying so hard to help them—­has committed suicide!”

Mrs. Prescott uttered an exclamation of horror.  Katie patted the shoulder beside her soothingly, understandingly, and as if begging for calm.  Even under her light touch she seemed to feel the nerves leap up.

Mr. Osborne turned to them.  “Poor Cal, she’d better let things alone.  What’s the use?  She can’t do anything with people like that.”

“It’s the cause of the suicide that’s the disgusting thing,” said Colonel Leonard.

“Or rather,” amended his wife, “the lack of cause.”

“But surely,” protested Mrs. Prescott, “no girl would take her life without—­what she thought was cause.  Surely all human beings hold life and death too sacred for that.”

“Oh, do they?” scoffed Mrs. Leonard.  “Not that class.  I scarcely expect you to believe me—­I had a hard time believing it myself—­but she says she committed suicide—­she left a note for her room-mate—­because she was ‘tired of not having any fun!’”

The hand upon Ann’s shoulder grew fairly eloquent.  And Ann seemed trying.  Her hands were tightly clasped in her lap.

“Why, I don’t know,” said Wayne, “I think that’s about one of the best reasons I can think of.”

“This is not a jesting matter, Captain Jones,” said Mrs. Leonard severely.

“Far from it,” said Wayne.

“Think what it means to a girl like Caroline Osborne!  A girl who is trying to do something for humanity—­to find the people she wants to uplift so trivial—­so without souls!”

“It is hard on Cal,” agreed Cal’s father.

“Though perhaps just a trifle harder,” ventured Wayne, “on the girl who did.”