“Don’t cry, little Margaret!” Martie murmured, happy under the kindly adjusting old hands.  The old woman stumped about composedly, opening bureau drawers and scratching matches in the kitchen, before she would condescend to telephone for the superfluous doctor.  She was pouring a flood of Yiddish endearments and diminutives about the newcomer, when the surprised practitioner arrived.  Mrs. Simons scouted the idea of a nurse; she would come upstairs, her daughters would come upstairs—­what was it, one baby!  Martie was allowed a cupful of hot milk, and went to sleep with one arm about the flannel bundle that was Margaret.

Well—­she thought, drifting into happy dreams—­of course, the hospital was wonderful:  the uniformed nurses, the system, the sanitation.  But this was wonderful, too.  So many persons had to be consulted, had to be involved, in the coming of a hospital baby; so much time, so many different rooms and hallways.

The clock had not yet struck two; she had given Wallace his breakfast at eleven, Isabeau would be home at five; Grandma had gone downstairs to borrow some of the put-away clothes of the last little Napthaly.  Martie had nothing to do but smile and sleep.  To-morrow, perhaps, they would let her go on with “The Life of the Bee.”

Peace lapped soul and body.  The long-approaching trial was over.  In a few days she would arise, mistress of herself once more, and free to remake her life.

First, they must move.  Even if they could afford to pay six hundred dollars a year in rent, this flat was neither convenient nor sanitary for little children.  Secondly, Wallace must understand that while he worked and was sober, his wife would do her share; if he failed her, she must find some other life.  Thirdly, as soon as the baby’s claims made it possible, Martie must find some means of making money; her own money, independent of what Wallace chose to give.

She pondered the various possibilities.  She could open a boarding-house; although that meant an outlay for furniture and rent.  She could take a course in library work or stenography; that meant leaving the children all day.

She began to study advertisements in the newspapers for working housekeepers, and one day wrote a businesslike application to the company that controlled a line of fruit steamers between the city and Panama.  Mrs. Napthaly’s sister-in-law was stewardess on one of these, and had good pay.  Short stories, film-plays, newspaper work—­ other women did these things.  But how had they begun?

“Begin at the beginning!” she said cheerfully to herself.  The move was the beginning.  Through the cool autumn days she resolutely hunted for flats.  It was a wearisome task, especially when Wallace accompanied her, for his tastes ran to expensive and vestibuled apartments and fashionable streets.  Martie sternly held to quiet side streets, cut off from the city by the barriers of elevated trains and the cheap shopping districts.