CHAPTER IX
VALENTINE'S DAY
It was the day after Lincoln's birthday, and Saturday. Edward Watkins had come out for his weekly visit to Elisabeth and was sitting in Mrs. Smith's living room surveying her and talking to Miss Merriam. Elisabeth was walking with a fair degree of steadiness now, and made her way about all the rooms of the house without assistance. She still preferred to crawl upstairs and she could do that so fast that the person who was supposed to watch her had to be faithful or she would disappear while an eye lingered too long on the page of an interesting book or on the face of a friend.
Downstairs Edward leaned forward from his chair in front of Gertrude and picked up the ball from which she was knitting a soldier's scarf. He paid out the yarn to her as she needed it.
"You're happy here, aren't you?" he asked softly.
"Happy! I should say so! Next to having your very own home I can't imagine anything lovelier than this, with dear people and a pretty house and a darling baby. It's beautiful."
"You'd hate to leave it, wouldn't you?"
"Leave it? Why should I leave it? I think they like me. I think they want me to stay."