"Was it the wrong door after all, Stephen? Has she not been protected and loved as her mother would have wished until she knows what love is, even if she has suffered in a lesser way?"
"Yes, Jeanne, in one way; but do you realize, at the same time, in what a light she has learned to regard her father, and that a knowledge of his unrelenting spite is almost a part of her being? In all this is her mother justified, but how inextricably it complicates the future and its relations to every one concerned."
"How and when shall you tell her, Stephen? To-night?"
"No, I am much too worn. I will write her a brief note at once, saying that papers have come to me concerning the identity of her parents, and asking her to come here at once. She will get the note in the morning mail and be able to accustom herself to the contents without the effort of speech."
"Why do you not go to her?"
"Because Poppea will need to be alone with her mother's papers for a space. It would be too trying if she should hear it first amid the confusion at the office or in the company of any one, even of Oliver Gilbert."
"Is it not strange, Stephen, that 'Lisha Potts, who was the first to open the door that night, should have been the one to bring this all about?"
"Yes, Jeanne, more than strange; we seem to be floating in mystery. No, I cannot sleep yet; I must let the organ speak to me. Come into the church for a little while, dearest, and sit beside me while I play."