As Ethel hung up the receiver she felt a little faint and queer.  When Joe came back this evening she would have to face him alone!  In vain she angrily told herself that it only needed common sense.  The picture of his tired face, nerves all on edge, rose in her mind.  The way his jealousy had flared up!  No, it would not be easy!  She might even—­fail with him!  At the thought, a foolish panic came.  More walking was required. . . .  She heard Susette beginning her supper, and she went in and sat with the child.  And at first that worked out very well.  Soon she was smiling and listening to the ceaseless chatter of the small girl.  But suddenly Ethel exclaimed to herself, “Suppose I do fail, after all!  If there’s a divorce he’ll take them both!” She jumped up in a frightened way, and went into her bedroom.  She threw herself sobbing on the bed—­but in a few minutes regained control with an effort and lay there motionless.  The tangle was growing clearer now.

The very best she could hope was to make Joe half believe her, she thought.  And that would mean she would have to drop Dwight and all chance of meeting those people he knew.  She would live with a Joe so suspicious that she would be under his friend, Fanny Carr.  “She’ll be my friend, and bring me in touch with whatever other people she likes.  I’ll have to be nice to them—­every one.  And I’ll live her life.  Amy’s life.”  She looked at the large photograph over on Joe’s chiffonier.  “Perhaps after all I shall be like her.  How do I know what she was at my age?  As I grow older, all hemmed in, why not stop caring for anything else?

“Oh, now do let’s be sensible!” With an impatient movement of her lithe beautiful figure Ethel was up off the bed and walking the room with grim resolution in her brown eyes.  Soon she was much quieter.  She felt the warm youth within her rise.  There must be a way!  So far, so good.  But the moment she tried to think what way, again at once she was off her ground.  What could she do or say to Joe?  Her failure to manage him that afternoon had shaken her confidence in herself.  Ethel was only twenty-five, and now she felt even younger than that.  All at once in a sickening way her courage oozed; she felt herself ignorant and alone.  Why did not Joe come back, she asked.  Was he going to stay away all night?  And if he did, what would it mean?  She remembered what he had said when he left:  “Then you and I are through, you know.”  All right, then what was he going to do!  “I don’t even know how a man goes about it, if he wants to get a divorce!” And panic seized her as before.  “I can’t do this all by myself!  I can’t talk to him as I’ve got to talk—­not till I know just what to say!  I bungled it so!  I need sound advice!  Oh, for somebody to help me!” She thought of Dwight, but she would not go near him!  She loathed the very sight of him now!  Why had not he told her of those other affairs of his that could rise in this way against herself?