He smiled in that sudden, radiant way of his.
"No; the Fort is here to shelter and protect other people. You don't need it."
"But I do; and it's my Fort. Why, you've never even taken my name off the door."
The old woman recalled a glimpse she had had the evening before of Val laying her cheek against the graven name.
"I'm not sure but I shall take it off," she said, half smiling, half threatening.
"You don't want to get me out of the habit of thinking of the Fort as 'home'?"
"You've never really been in the habit—you belong elsewhere."
He studied her in perplexity.
"Do you realize that at this moment the rain is coming in floods into Uncle John's room?"
"The rain won't trouble your uncle John." She had turned away again.