For some moments Joan appeared to be in a blacker state of brooding than usual; then she said, in a candid and friendly tone, which somehow contrasted with her knit and swarthy brows– “No, really. At least I think I’ve only found out two things; and they are only things about myself. I’ve discovered that I do like heroism, but I don’t like hero worship.”
“Surely,” said Miss Browning, in the Girton manner, “the one always flows from the other.”
“I hope not,” said Joan.
“But what else can you do with the hero?” asked Mrs. Mackintosh, still without looking up from her writing, “except worship him?”
“You might crucify him,” said Joan, with a sudden return of savage restlessness, as she rose from her chair. “Things seem to happen then.”
“Aren’t you tired?” asked the Miss Browning who had the clever face.
“Yes,” said Joan, “and the worst sort of tiredness; when you don’t even know what you’re tired of. To tell the honest truth, I think I’m tired of this house.”
“It’s very old, of course, and parts of it are still dismal,” said Miss Browning, “but he has enormously improved it. The decoration, with the moon and stars, down in the wing with the turret is really–”
Away in the distant music room, Lady Enid, having found the music she preferred, was fingering its prelude on the piano. At the first few notes of it, Joan Brett stood up, like a tigress.
“Thanks–” she said, with a hoarse softness, “that’s it, of course! and that’s just what we all are! She’s found the right tune now.”