“You believe in the law of compensation, don’t you, Aunt Jo?” asked Susan, on a wonderful April afternoon, when she had gone straight from the office to Sausalito.  The two women were in the Carroll kitchen, Susan sitting at one end of the table, her thoughtful face propped in her hands, Mrs. Carroll busy making ginger cakes,—­ cutting out the flat little circles with an inverted wine-glass, transferring them to the pans with the tip of her flat knife, rolling the smooth dough, and spilling the hot cakes, as they came back from the oven, into a deep tin strainer to cool.  Susan liked to watch her doing this, liked the pretty precision of every movement, the brisk yet unhurried repetition of events, her strong clever hands, the absorbed expression of her face, her fine, broad figure hidden by a stiffly-starched gown of faded blue cotton and a stiff white apron.

Beyond the open window an exquisite day dropped to its close.  It was the time of fruit-blossoms and feathery acacia, languid, perfumed breezes, lengthening twilights, opening roses and swaying plumes of lilac.  Sausalito was like a little park, every garden ran over with sweetness and color, every walk was fringed with flowers, and hedged with the new green of young trees and blossoming hedges.  Susan felt a delicious relaxation run through her blood; winter seemed really routed; to-day for the first time one could confidently prophesy that there would be summer presently, thin gowns and ocean bathing and splendid moons.

“Yes, I believe in the law of compensation, to a great extent,” the older woman answered thoughtfully, “or perhaps I should call it the law of solution.  I truly believe that to every one of us on this earth is given the materials for a useful and a happy life; some people use them and some don’t.  But the chance is given alike.”

“Useful, yes,” Susan conceded, “but usefulness isn’t happiness.”

“Isn’t it?  I really think it is.”

“Oh, Aunt Jo,” the girl burst out impatiently, “I don’t mean for saints!  I dare say there are some girls who wouldn’t mind being poor and shabby and lonesome and living in a boarding-house, and who would be glad they weren’t hump-backed, or blind, or Siberian prisoners!  But you can’t say you think that a girl in my position has had a fair start with a girl who is just as young, and rich and pretty and clever, and has a father and mother and everything else in the world!  And if you do say so,” pursued Susan, with feeling, “you certainly can’t mean so—–­”

“But wait a minute, Sue!  What girl, for instance?”

“Oh, thousands of girls!” Susan said, vaguely.  “Emily Saunders, Alice Chauncey—–­”

“Emily Saunders!  Susan!  In the hospital for an operation every other month or two!” Mrs. Carroll reminded her.

“Well, but—–­” Susan said eagerly.  “She isn’t really ill.  She just likes the excitement and having them fuss over her.  She loves the hospital.”