She had spent the night before, after the lecture to which she went alone, in writing a letter to her father. It was a long intimate letter, telling of the kind of work she was doing, the way she was living and of what she was thinking. She wrote as if she were talking to him, on and on, and her ending was like the conclusion of a talk, as if she asked for his blessing. “So you see, father dear, I’m all right. And I want you to know that I never forget what you’ve said to me—that I must live so that I’ll never be ashamed of having had life entrusted to me.”
She was really not afraid at all. Her demurring had been only the mechanical reactions of conventions which sat lightly on her. In her heart she knew that she was at home with Gregory and that the completeness of their mutual understanding could mean only that they belonged together. Gregory, like her father, reassured her. In the midst of his impetuousness, his driving thinking, she felt the purity without which he could not have been quite so free. She felt his kindness too, and the gentleness of his hands. He was like her father, she thought. Her father had perhaps had the glory of adventure in him too once, but it had been made submissive to circumstance. It had left its residue of understanding. She felt very sure that when he knew he would be glad.
Physically her fine fearlessness and eager nerves kept her from any reaction, or from any of the terrors, real or assumed, which women have come to believe right and modest at the approach of marriage. And minor faults of Gregory she never paused to consider. It would not have occurred to her that it was a fitting time to look for them. Little problems, living difficulties troubled her serene health not at all. She would have been ashamed to measure them up against her love. The latent spirit of adventure in her, her fine romantic training, taken from books and preserved because of her limited knowledge of people, were like winds blowing her on to the heart of her romance.
With all this strength and surety, this Ali Baba’s cave of beauty to explore, it was yet characteristic of her that she could work. She had been in the office four days and already her place was made. It was easy to see that she was intelligently competent and to know that her efficiency was not a matter of making a first impression. They all liked her and she already was beginning to lighten work for various people.
Flandon was not at the office at all on Saturday. He called up in the course of the morning and speaking briefly to Freda told her to tell Mr. Sable that he was going out of town over the week-end and would be back for the hearing of the Kraker case on Monday morning. That made it easier for Freda. She had a little fear that there might have been some extra duty for her on this Saturday afternoon which would wreck the golden plans. So at noon she put her desk in order—she was beginning to feel her proprietorship in a desk now—and went back to her room to get her bag, packed the night before.
She had meant to leave a note for Miss Duffield, but by chance she met her on the stairs. Margaret looked at the bag and made her own quick deduction.
“Going home for the week-end?”
“I’ll be back Monday,” said Freda, feeling rather rotten as she let Margaret’s misunderstanding pass.
But she forgot about that. She forgot everything as she went out in the street full of May sunshine and ran for the street-car which would take her to the railway station. There, in the noon crowd, she put her bag between her feet and hung on to the strap above her head, unable to keep the smile from her face any longer.
Gregory was there waiting for her. And at the first word he spoke, his spirit of exalted happiness carried Freda up into the heights. He had a word of endearment for her and then with her bag and his held in one hand, he managed with the other to hold her close to his side and they went to find their train.