"Oh, perfectly," answered Eleanor. "I don't know what I'm going to do. It depends on mother. I—"
Dr. Green swept "mother" aside and Eleanor's further explanations with her. "You ought to have experiences; you ought to see pictures and hear fine music and see the world. You—why, Eleanor, you're young, you have talent, you have the finest of prospects! I wouldn't think of anything else. I'd make all my plans for every minute of the day to accomplish one end. You haven't any encumbrances, you haven't any duties! But you must realize that you can't serve two masters. If you have talent, it's a trust, and you've got to improve it. If you don't, if you betray the trust, you'll suffer all your life." He came back and bent over her. "My dear Eleanor, promise to listen to what I say!"
Eleanor's voice refused to obey her bidding. She felt an excitement almost as intense as Dr. Green's and confidence in herself returned.
"Promise me!"
"I promise."
Then she rose unsteadily. Dr. Green's eyes disturbed her. "I must go home. Mother will want me."
Dr. Green did not go with her to the door; instead he tramped up and down his untidy room. "'Mother will want me!'" said he when she had gone.
Eleanor's mood lasted until morning. But when Richard did not come, morning, afternoon, or evening, either that day or the next, ambition became once more ashes in her mouth. It was all very well for Dr. Green to command her to write. Writing could be accomplished only with a mind at peace; talent was not a friend, but a fickle mistress, the companion of happy hours and not a panacea for heartache. She could not understand how her mother, completing her little round of daily duties, could be so quiet, so content. Presently the sight bred resentment. No sympathetic heart could be at rest when one's own was so ill at ease. When another day passed and still Richard did not come, she grew, for the first time in her life, irritable. Presently she put a question without preface as she and her mother sat together in the little dining-room on a rainy evening. The house had seemed all day like a prison.
"Mother, I wish you would tell me something about my father."
Mrs. Bent's head bowed itself lower over her work. The question had all the suddenness of an unexpected thunderbolt.