Sidney, as tender as ever, had lost a little of the radiance from her eyes;
her voice had deepened. Where she had been a pretty girl, she was now
lovely. She was back in the hospital again, this time in the children's
ward. K., going in one day to take Johnny Rosenfeld a basket of fruit, saw
her there with a child in her arms, and a light in her eyes that he had
never seen before. It hurt him, rather--things being as they were with him.
When he came out he looked straight ahead.

With the opening of spring the little house at Hillfoot took on fresh
activities. Tillie was house-cleaning with great thoroughness. She
scrubbed carpets, took down the clean curtains, and put them up again
freshly starched. It was as if she found in sheer activity and fatigue a
remedy for her uneasiness.

Business had not been very good. The impeccable character of the little
house had been against it. True, Mr. Schwitter had a little bar and
served the best liquors he could buy; but he discouraged rowdiness--had
been known to refuse to sell to boys under twenty-one and to men who had
already overindulged. The word went about that Schwitter's was no place
for a good time. Even Tillie's chicken and waffles failed against this
handicap.

By the middle of April the house-cleaning was done. One or two motor
parties had come out, dined sedately and wined moderately, and had gone
back to the city again. The next two weeks saw the weather clear. The
roads dried up, robins filled the trees with their noisy spring songs, and
still business continued dull.