Then she began almost tearing off her other garments.

"Lucy," said Mrs.Ayres, "you are over twenty years old, and a woman grown, but you are not as strong as I am, and I used to take you over my knee and spank you when you were a child and didn't behave, and I'll do it now if you are not careful.

You unfasten that corset-cover properly.

You are tearing the lace." Lucy gazed at her mother a moment in a frenzy of rage, then suddenly her face began to work piteously.

She flung herself face downward upon her bed, and sobbed long, hysterical sobs.