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she had been right. They sold three more hats. But this was so absurdly below Ann’s anticipation of “a rush” that when she closed the shop and retired to her own room to boil her kettle for “tea,” she felt more than a little disheartened. However, after she had disposed of her solitary meal, she resolved to go for a walk. Fresh air and exercise would help her to regain her courage. After all, if she only sold nine hats a week she would be paying her overhead expenses and living, meagerly no doubt, but still living. The trouble was that at the moment Ann didn’t really much care whether she lived or not.

She walked down the deserted street and crossed the river, making her way out of the town towards the encircling hills, clear in outline now against the sunset sky. Comfortable looking wooden houses with creeper-hung verandas, standing in bright-flowered gardens, lay on either side of the road. On some of the lawns white-frocked girls and young men in flannels were playing tennis. Ann heard their voices and their laughter as she passed by. She was unutterably lonely, and not a little sorry for herself; but she knew that self-pity is the refuge of-the weak, and she determined not to indulge in it. After all, what had she to endure compared to the suffering which poor Dick Holmes had been called upon to undergo? If he had courage enough to face the shipwreck of all his hopes, surely she, who had no more to lament than the awakening from a foolish remantic dream, could try at least to live up to the epithet both he and Rodney had applied to her. She would be a “good plucked ’un.” She would! So after an hour’s quick walking, she returned to her deserted shop, turned on the