THE OLD MAID
child, who had caught small-pox at the circus to which an unprincipled nurse had surreptitiously taken him. After such a warning as that, parents felt justified in every precaution against contagion. And poor people were so ignorant and careless, and their children, of course, so perpetually exposed to everything catching. No, Joe Ralston was certainly right, and Charlotte almost insanely unreasonable. But it would be useless to tell her so now. Instinctively, Delia temporized.
“After all,” she whispered to the prone ear, “if it’s only after you have children—you may not have any—for some time.”
“Oh, yes, I shall!” came back in anguish from the cushions.
Delia smiled with matronly superiority. “Really, Chatty, I don’t quite see how you can know. You don’t understand.”
Charlotte Lovell lifted herself up. Her
