"Such fancies will help you out a good bit, my dear; it's well you have a word or two of French to get along with. I used to hear it when I was a girl in Cape Breton."
I caught the shadow of a memory settle in her eyes. We were at the gate. The train was made up.
"I must say goodby here, my dear; they won't let me in to the train."
I took both her hands again. "Goodby, Delia Beaseley," I began; then something choked me. I so wanted to thank her for all her goodness to me. "I wish I knew what to say—how to thank—"
"There, there, my dear, I 'm the one to be thankful. I 've been reaping a harvest just from one little seed I sowed near twenty-six years ago—and I never thought to see so much as a blade of grass! That's all. I 'm wonderful grateful it's been given me to see such a harvest."
"Oh, Delia, if I only amounted to something, so that you could be proud of your little harvest—"
"Now, don't, my dear, don't; don't say nothing more, but just go straight forward with God's blessing, which is the same as mine this time, and—don't forget me if ever you need a friend."
My eyes filled with unaccustomed tears. A curious thought: New York, the Juggernaut, the fetich of millions, just when I was ridding myself of the horror of its awful presence, was about to bind me to it through this new-old friend!
I caught her rough toil-worn hand in both mine and pressed my lips to it; then I dropped it, and walked rapidly down the platform to the train. Not once did I look behind me.
For a little while after entering the luxurious sleeping car, I felt awkward, uncomfortable; I had never been in one before. But when I was settled in my ample, high-backed section, and the train began to move slowly out of the station and through the tunnel, I felt more at ease. After that, with every mile that the train, moving more and more swiftly, put between me and the city's sights and sounds, I felt a rising of spirits, an ease of mind and body I had never before experienced.