“Do you mean the—the painter is married, Robert?”
“Yes, and got this boy,” Robert said, shaking his head. “I bet I do have trouble with him, if he’s got to be around here until they get three coats o’ paint on our house. Mamma thought they only needed two, but papa said three, and the painter talked mamma into it this morning.”
“The house?” Muriel said. “We’re going to have the—the house painted?”
Robert was rather surprised. “Why, don’t you remember how much papa and mamma were talkin’ about it, two or three weeks ago? And then they thought not and didn’t say so much about it, but for a while papa was goin’ to have every painter in town come up here and make a bid. Don’t you remember?”
“I do now,” Muriel said feebly; and a moment later she glanced toward the bright windows of the house across the street. “Robert,” she said, “if you’ve finished those horrible peanuts, you might run and ask Mr. Renfrew Mears if he’d mind coming over a little while.”
She had been deeply stirred by the subject that had occupied her all day, and it was a spiritual necessity for her (so to say) to continue upon the topic with somebody—even with Renfrew Mears! However, she rejected him again, though with a much greater consideration for his feelings than was customary; and when he departed, she called after him:
“Look out for your clothes when you come over to-morrow. We’re going to have the house painted.”
Then, smiling contentedly, she went indoors and up to her room. The great vase of hydrangeas stood upon a table; she looked at it absently, and was reminded of something. She took some sheets of written paper from a notebook in her desk, tossed them into a waste-basket, yawned, and went to bed.