And sitting in the warm, sunny room of the yellow house, Larry began to believe he had! It was always so easy for him to see one small spot.
At the first he was a hero, and the Forest paid homage to him; listened at his shrine and fed his reviving ego. But heroes cloy the taste, in time, and the most thrilling tales wax dull when they are worn to shreds. More and more Larry grew to depend upon Mary-Clare and Noreen for company and upon Jan-an for a never-failing listener to his tales.
Noreen, just now, puzzled Mary-Clare. The child’s old aversion to her father seemed to have passed utterly from her thought. She was devoted to him; touched his maimed body reverently, and wooed him from the sad moments that presently began to overpower him.
She assumed an old and protecting manner toward him that would have been amusing had it not been so tragically pathetic.
Every afternoon Larry took a nap, sitting in an old kitchen rocker. Poised on the arm of the chair, her father’s head upon her tiny shoulder, Noreen sang him to sleep.
“You’re my baby, daddy-linkum, and I’m your motherly. Come, shut your eyes, and lall a leep!”
And Larry would sleep, often to awake with an unwholesome merriment that frightened Mary-Clare.
One late summer afternoon she was sitting with him by the open door. The beautiful hills opposite were still rich with flowers and green bushes. Suddenly Larry said:
“It’s great, this being home!”