"You will find the house will be snapped up, dear, if you take too long thinking of it," she said with asperity.
Cynthia looked at her with innocent eyes.
"But I expect there will be other houses in London, won't there?" she asked.
She had no wish to be churlish, she understood how deeply her companion longed for the paved roadways and the streets. And in her own heart, too, she was beginning to turn to the unknown world of London with an expectancy of adventure, which drew her and thrilled her, even while she hesitated.
"I don't understand you, Cynthia," Diana Royle cried in exasperation. "Are you afraid?"
The question was intended merely as a gibe, but Cynthia turned to her with startled eyes, and Mrs. Royle knew that she had chanced upon a truth.
"Of what are you afraid?" she asked curiously, and Cynthia answered while she looked into the fire:
"I once lay all night staring into a great bright mirror which revealed to me a shut door. I was in terror lest the door should open. I dreaded what might come through. I seem still to be looking into the great mirror, and with the same kind of fear. Only now the door opens upon the world, and not on the passage of a house."
Diana Royle gathered up her embroidery and her book.
"If you are going to talk that sort of nonsense, Cynthia, I shall go to bed," she remarked sternly, and left Cynthia still gazing into the fire.