"Don't worry about me, madam. I make out very well."
"And you are all alone there? All alone in that dark, grim old house? Oh, how terribly lonely it must be. I—" she shivered slightly.
"I have a scrub-woman in twice a month, and Murray comes to see me once in awhile. I read a great deal."
"And your meals?"
"I get my own breakfast, and go down to Sixth Avenue for my luncheons and dinners. There is an excellent little restaurant quite near, you see,—conducted by a very estimable Southern lady in reduced circumstances. Her husband is a Northerner, however, and she doesn't see a great deal of him. I understand he is a person of very uncertain habits. They say he gambles. Her daughter assists her with the business. She—but, I beg pardon; you would not be interested in them."
"I am glad that you are contented, Wade. We will consider the matter settled, and you will go on as heretofore. You may always find me here, if you desire to communicate with me at any time."
Wade looked around the room. Anne's maid had come in and was employed in restoring a quantity of flowers to the boxes in which they had been delivered. There were roses and violets and orchids in profusion.
Mrs. Thorpe took note of his interest. "You will be interested to hear, Wade, that my sister-in-law is expecting a little baby very soon. I am taking the flowers up to her flat."
"A baby," said Wade softly. "That will be fine, madam."
After Wade's departure, Anne ordered a taxi, and, with the half dozen boxes of flowers piled up in front of her, set out for George's home. On the way up through the park she experienced a strange sense of exaltation, a curious sort of tribute to her own lack of selfishness in the matter of the flowers. This feeling of self-exaltation was so pleasing to her, so full of promise for further demands upon her newly discovered nature, that she found herself wondering why she had allowed herself to be cheated out of so much that was agreeable during all the years of her life! She was now sincerely in earnest in her desire to be kind and gentle and generous toward others. She convinced herself of that in more ways than one. In the first place, she enjoyed thinking first of the comforts of others, and secondly of herself. That in itself was most surprising to her. Up to a year or two ago she would have deprived herself of nothing unless there was some personal satisfaction to be had from the act, such as the consciousness that the object of her kindness envied her the power to give, or that she could pity herself for having been obliged to give without return. Now she found joy in doing the things she once abhorred,—the unnecessary things, as she had been pleased to describe them.