“Where y’ going?” asked Julia, noticing that he carried a hand bag.

George sat down on the dirty cement steps that connected his dwelling with the sidewalk, and drew Julia between his knees.

“I’ve got to go away, baby,” said he soberly.

“And ain’t choo going to take me to the Park—­never?” asked Julia, with a trembling lip.

George freed a lock of her hair that had gotten caught in her collar, with clumsy, gentle fingers.

“Mama’s mad at me, and I’m going away for a while, Babe,” said he, clearing his throat.  “But you be a good girl, and I’ll come take you to the Park some day.”

Something in the gravity of his tone impressed Julia.

“But I don’t want you to go away,” she said tearfully.  George got up hastily.

“Come on, walk with Pop to the car,” he commanded, and Julia trotted contentedly beside him to Market Street.  There she gave him a child’s soft, impersonal kiss, staring up at the buildings opposite as she did so.  George jumped on a cable car, wedged his bag under his knees as he took a seat on the dummy, and looked back at the little figure that was moving toward the dingy opening of O’Farrell Street, and at the spring sunshine, bright on the child’s hair.

CHAPTER II

In summer the rear parlour that was Mrs. Page’s bedroom was a rather dim and dreary place; such light as it had fell through one long, high window that gave only upon a narrow air shaft; it was only in mid-July that the actual sunlight—­a bright and fleeting triangle—­touched the worn red carpet and the curly-maple bed.  In winter the window gave almost no light at all.  Julia dressed by gaslight ten months out of the year, and had to sit up in her warm blankets and stare at the clock on a certain January morning in her fifteenth year, to make sure whether it said twenty minutes of eleven or five minutes of eight o’clock.  It was five minutes of eight—­no mistake about it—­but eight o’clock was early for the Pages, mother and daughter.  Julia sighed, and cautiously stretched forth an arm, a bare, shapely little arm, with bangles on the round wrist and rings on the smooth fingers, and picked a book from the floor.  Cautiously settling herself on the pillows she plunged into her novel, now and then pushing back a loose strand of hair, or bringing her pretty fingernails close to her eyes for an admiring and critical scrutiny.

An hour passed—­another hour.  The clock in the front room struck a silvery ten.  Then Julia slammed her book noisily together, and gave a sharp push to the recumbent form beside her.

“Ah—­no—­darling!” moaned Mrs. Page, tortured out of dreams.  “Don’t—­Julie—­”

“Aw, wake up, Mama!” the daughter urged.  Whereupon the older woman rolled on her back, yawned luxuriously, and said, quite composedly: 

“Hello, darling!  What time is it?”