They sat for a moment in silence, Miss Barry liking her companion better and better, finding it easy to believe on general principles that Linda had been cruel to him.
King rose suddenly from his brown study. "Will you give her these flowers, please?" he said, indicating a box that lay on a chair. "I shall get Harriet to arrange a meeting for us to discuss the matters that are pressing."
Miss Barry rose, and they looked into one another's eyes.
"I had hoped that it might be some comfort to Linda to see me, as one who stood so close to her father," said King wistfully.
Miss Barry found him pathetic.
"Seems to work the other way," she answered curtly. "Some folks would think of your side of it. I can tell you, though, Mr. King, the rest of the family appreciates all you have done and are doing."
Miss Barry's hand gave the young man's a decided squeeze as they parted. Her handshakes ordinarily were of the loose and hard variety.
She turned and took up the box of flowers. King's offering had come daily among others since the funeral, but Linda would not allow any flowers to be left in her room.
"I'd like to know just what she means by flashing up at the mention of that poor fellow's name," soliloquized Miss Belinda, as she mounted the stairs. "Lambert's gone and left him to take the brunt of the situation. Shouldn't wonder if going down to that office every day is some like going to a torture chamber."
She entered her niece's room. Linda was sitting before the dresser, pulling over with languid fingers the contents of a drawer. Each article in it was associated with happy, remote days separated from the present by a cold, dark, impassable gulf—the gulf of grief, remorse, and despair. Nothing could bring her father back. Every interest that had kept her from him loomed hateful in her eyes. Just as Miss Barry entered the room her hand had fallen on a morocco box. It contained the necklace which had been her graduation gift from him. She had worn it at the dinner dance at the South Shore Club.