'What a Philistine room it is,' said Gerald, smiling as he looked around him; 'but I must say I like it just as it is. It has never made an æsthetic effort.'
Gerald's smile irradiated the whole house for Althea, and lit up, in especial, the big, sunny school-room where he and Helen found most memories of all. 'The same old table, Helen,' he said, 'and other children have spilled ink on it and scratched their initials just as we used to; here are yours and mine. Do you remember the day we did them under Fräulein's very nose? And here are all our old books, too. Look, Helen, the Roman history with your wicked drawings on the fly-leaves: Tullia driving over her poor old father, and Cornelia—ironic little wretch you were even then—what a prig she is with her jewels! And what splendid butter-scotch you used to make over the fire on winter evenings.'
Helen remembered everything, smiling as she followed Gerald about the room and looked at ruthless Tullia; and Althea, watching them, was touched—for them, and then, with a little counter-stroke of memory, for herself. She remembered her old home too—the dignified old house in steep Chestnut Street, and the little house on the blue Massachusetts coast where she had often passed long days playing by herself, for she had been an only child. She loved it here, for it was like a home, peaceful and sheltering; but where in all the world had she really a home? Where in all the world did she belong? The thought brought tears to her eyes as she looked out of the schoolroom window and listened to Gerald and Helen. It had ended, of course, for of course it had really begun, in Althea's decision to take Merriston House. It was quite fixed now, and on the way back she had made her new friends promise to be often together with her in the home of their youth. She had made them promise this so prettily and with such gentle warmth that it was very natural that Gerald, in talking over the event with Helen that evening, should say, strolling round Helen's little sitting-room, 'She's rather a dear, that little friend of yours.'
Helen was tired and lay extended on the divan in the grey dress she had not had time to change. She had doffed her hat and, thrusting its hatpins through it, had laid it on her knees, so that, as Gerald had remarked, she looked rather like Brünhilde on her rocky couch. But, unlike Brünhilde, her hands were clasped behind her neck, and she looked up at the ceiling. 'A perfect little dear,' she assented.
'Did you notice her eyes when she was talking about the foxes? They were as sorrowful and piteous as a Mater Dolorosa's. She is definite enough about some things, isn't she? Things like right and wrong, I mean, as she sees them.'
'Yes; she is clear about outside things, like right and wrong.'
'It's a good deal to be clear about, isn't it?'
'I suppose so,' Helen reflected. 'I don't feel that I really understand Althea. People who aren't clear about themselves are difficult to understand, I think.'
'It's that that really gives them a mystery. I feel that she really is a little mysterious,' said Gerald. 'One wonders what she would do in certain cases, and feel in certain situations, and one can't remotely imagine. She is a sealed book.'
'She wonders,' said Helen.