"Thank you, Gladys. It will please me. But there's something that pleases me more. I'd like to tell all three of you about it."
Jennie turned round from the window, coming back down the room. She was pale, but she didn't cry. Gussie dried her eyes and was struggling to her feet when Bob laid his hand on her shoulder.
"No, Gussie; stay where you are. I'll sit down here." He dropped into the chair. "You come on this side, Jennie. Gladys—"
But Gladys had already crouched at his feet, while Jennie, balancing Gussie, sank beside the other arm of the chair. Pansy sprang up to her place on his knee.
He told them about Teddy and his mother—about Teddy's vision and his own.
"I don't say I know what to make of it. I'm not at all sure that we're obliged to explain that sort of thing unless we're scientists or psychologists. It seems to me that when beauty and comfort flash on us at a time of great need, we're at liberty to take them for what they seem to be, even if we don't understand them."
As his hand lay on the arm of the chair, Jennie kissed it again and again. It was the first spontaneous affection she had ever shown him, and, though it moved him with a stirring strange and fundamental, he felt that with the awesome things so fresh in their minds, the time had not yet come to respond to it. It was one more impulse to gather force by being restrained a little longer.
"It isn't as if this thing stood alone. A great many people have had experiences like it. They may be no more than fancy, just as some people say; but I do know this: that by what he saw Teddy was helped to do what he had to do, and that for me—"
"Yes, Bob," Gladys pleaded. "What was it for you?"
"Something real—and assuring—and beautiful—and comforting—and glorious." He uttered the words slowly, as if selecting his terms. "More than that," he went on, "it was something that's given me a happiness I can't describe but which I should like to share with you—which perhaps I shall be able to share with you—as we get to know one another better—and time goes on."