She nodded brightly.
Morgan turned to the shelf, took down a large volume of Shakespeare's plays, and laying it on the table began to turn the pages rapidly. Rosalind looked over his arm. He ran his finger down a leaf presently and pointed to the line. "There," he said.
Rosalind turned back a page and pointed to her own name, and then they both laughed as if it were a great coincidence.
A sharp tap on his arm made Miss Herbert's presence known to Morgan. Miss Herbert was not of Friendship. She knew the value of time if the cabinet-maker did not, and had no idea of waiting while he discussed Shakespeare in pantomime with Rosalind.
Miss Herbert with the aid of the tablet, and Morgan with many queer gestures to help out his faltering tongue, so long without the guide of hearing, contrived to despatch the business relating to a claw-footed sofa. When it was finished, Rosalind was missing, and was discovered in the little garden, making friends with the black poodle, while the striped cat looked on from the fence.
It was with evident reluctance she accompanied Miss Herbert to the carriage. Before she left she took the tablet and wrote, "I am going to learn to talk on my fingers."
"Good," the cabinet-maker answered, and he followed them to the street, smiling and nodding. "Come again," he called as they drove away.
When he returned to the shop, the world seemed brighter, the mist of doubt had lifted.
"The rough places can't last always," he told himself as he sandpapered the claw toes of the sofa. "We are certain to come to a turn in the lane after a while. There's good in everything, somewhere."
Perhaps the coming of Mr. Pat's little girl was a good omen. To him at least it was a most interesting event, nor was he the only person in Friendship who found it so.