“I can’t remember more than one—or two,” said Dick judicially.
Lena laughed softly.
“I think it must have been very nice to be one of the few and be made a fuss over, instead of—”
“Instead of what?”
“Instead of having to grub and struggle for your bread,” Lena answered,—and there was a misty look in the big eyes she turned up to him.
“Poor little girl!” said Dick. “You certainly are not of the kind who ought to battle with the world. Haven’t you any man who could shelter you a little?”
Lena shook her head, with an air of patient suffering.
“My father is dead,” she said. “He was of a good family, as you might know by my name, but he was wounded in the war, and he never got over it. Of course he was very young then. He wasn’t married till long afterward. He died when I was a little thing.”
“That was the history of my father, too!” Dick felt a glow of kindred experience. “See, that is his portrait over the mantel.”
Lena looked very lovely and spiritual as she gazed up at the quiet face that looked back at her, and Dick watched her. Then she drew a full breath and turned her eyes on him.