"You have had your glimpse?"
"Yes. I'm fortified till the morning." Without further confidences, Richard took the first short cut that offered.
CHAPTER XXVII Epilogue
In late August of the next year, Thomasina came slowly across the green from the Lister house toward the campus gate. Mrs. Lister had begged her to stay longer, but she had felt a need for quietness. Mrs. Lister had been talking about Basil; she had not yet exhausted all possibilities for conversation in his strange posthumous fame, or in his attachment to Thomasina, so long unsuspected. She did not ask many questions at one time of Thomasina; they came slowly, a question or two this week, another question next month. Sometimes she wept.
"There are times when I can see just how I thought that dreadful thing about Basil and there are other times when I just cannot understand!"
"I wouldn't think of it," said Thomasina cheerfully. "And, anyway, Mary Alcestis, you didn't hurt any one but yourself."
A flood of tears choked Mrs. Lister's voice.
"I could explain it to Basil. He was always very kind and understanding." She looked at Thomasina with a sort of angry astonishment. "You are always so calm, and I—I am homesick to see Basil. I shall never be altogether at peace until I see him."