Patricia and Renée had long since gone to bed, side by side. Renée had cuddled down under the soft coverings with a little sigh of content. Very tired with long days of travel she had dropped off to sleep quickly, while Patricia's voice, pitched to a low tone, had gone on in an endless account of "what we'll do to-morrow!" Aunt Pen, tiptoeing in a little later, had found Patricia's hand clasping Renée's tightly under the covers.
She recalled that now as she sat with her brother before the library fire.
"Do you know, Thomas, you've done the most wonderful thing in the world for Pat?"
Pat's father stared at her. He had thought she meant to praise him for taking in the lonely little girl from France!
"Why--what do you mean?"
"Just this--Pat's going to have something now that she's never had before--true comradeship!"
Thomas Everett nodded his head. "That is so! Pat said something queer to me, about being lonely lots of times!"
"Of course she's been lonely--often! She's almost a stranger in her own home! You whisk her from school to the seashore or some such place and then back--to another school! And everything on earth is done for her, she doesn't have to think of anything for herself, let alone for anyone else!"
Pat's father laughed. "Why, I thought we were bringing her up along the most model lines! But perhaps you have some new fads now!" He liked to tease Penelope.
"Poor Pat has been the victim of too many fads already! I tell you, brother, this war has shown us a whole lot of silly mistakes we were making in our living!"