"You are going to give them money?"
"I have given it."
Lassie stood still in surprise, and yet, even surprised as she was, there was a perfunctory aspect which had not been present in the morning.
"And I have written a little letter to the hero of Miss Lathbun's romance, too."
Lassie came close. "Alva!" she asked, "then you really believe that there is such a man?"
Alva put out her hand and pulled the girl down upon her lap. "I do believe it," she said. "I may be deceived in some ways, but the man is real, I know. As I said before, one cannot invent that kind of character."
"And you wrote him? What did you say?"
"Only a few simple words. I felt that it was the right thing to do; I did it for the same reason that I do all things. Out of the might of my love. If you ever come to love as I do, you'll understand how wide and deep one's interest in all love can become—yes, in all love and in all things."
Lassie leaned her cheek upon her friend's hair for a moment and did not speak.
"I know what you're thinking," Alva went on then (but she did not know, really). "But do you know what I have been thinking? I have been wondering. Surely no two people could seem further out of my realm than these two forlorn women, but I always said there must be a reason and a strong one, or else they would not interest me so, and now you see what it was. They were brought to me to succor, and that is almost the greatest joy that I know now."