"Not that; but if he liked her a little ... he might consent to it ... just because he liked her and was tired maybe ... and that wouldn't be good for either of them."
"Well, anyway, it doesn't concern either of us," said Miss Havens.
The next evening as Peter was letting himself in at his own door—he had moved to the second floor front by this time—Mrs. Blodgett stopped him.
"Miss Havens left her regards for you," she explained. "She went to-day."
"Oh," said Peter, "wasn't it sudden?"
"Sort of. She'd been considerin' of it for some time, and last night she made up her mind. But I did think," said Mrs. Blodgett, "that she'd have said good-bye to you." And not eliciting anything by way of a reply, she added: "Miss Havens is a nice girl. I hate to think of her slavin' her life out in an office. She'd ought to get married."
"A girl has ever so many more chances in her home town," Peter offered hopefully.
"Yes, I suppose so." Mrs. Blodgett sighed. "Is there anything I can do for you, Mr. Weatheral?"
"Nothing, thank you." He was lingering still on the landing on Mrs. Blodgett's account, but he found his finger slipping between the leaves of the volume he had brought from the library.
"Ah," she warned him, "readin' is an improvin' occupation, but there's a book we hadn't any of us ought to miss, and that's the Book of Life, Mr. Weatheral." And somehow with that ringing in his ears, Peter spent several minutes walking up and down in his room before he could settle to his book again.