Miss Barry sniffed. "Linda," she said, "I don't know but I'd ought to go and dig up your grandmother's slipper!"
The girl smiled, and the older woman shook her head. "She is a handsome thing," she thought.
Mrs. Porter thought so too when she met them in Portland. In spite of the change wrought in her pupil's appearance during the last month she reflected how beauty at twenty-one will be beauty still.
"There's no place like home!" exclaimed Miss Barry, as she accepted Mrs. Porter's embrace. "I'm aching for one look at the ocean."
"Isn't she saucy to our grand lake?" asked Mrs. Porter, putting her hand through Linda's arm, and leading the way to the motor waiting outside.
"What does this mean?" asked Miss Barry. "The train's good enough for us."
"No, it's such a beautiful afternoon. It will rest you both to motor home," said Mrs. Porter. She supported Linda's arm, noting the feebleness of the girl's movements.
The two black-clothed women entered the car, the porter put in their suit-cases, Mrs. Porter jumped in, and they started. As yet Linda had scarcely spoken. It was curious to her to see her teacher thus, off duty, wearing an outing hat and corduroy. She, who had always been surrounded with a wall of delicate formality which no pupil save herself had ever had the audacity to break down, now smiling, tanned and rosy, girlish in her soft white hat, seemed another identity. Linda regarded her teacher gravely, while the latter responded cheerfully to Miss Barry's questions. The sun shone, the breeze was crisp.
As they emerged into the suburbs and countryside, all the joyousness of June smote upon the travelers' tired senses.
Linda turned her wistful eyes away when Mrs. Porter met them, a reassuring strength in her regard.