'No one knows,—certainly not the author! But it doesn't concern me in the least.'
'How can it be finished without you?' said Lucy wondering. Again she could not restrain the spirit of eager championship which had arisen in her mind of late; though she was tremulously uncertain as to how far she might express it.
Certainly Mrs. Burgoyne showed a slight stiffening of manner.
'It will have to get finished without me, I'm afraid. Luckily I'm not wanted; but if I were, I shall have no time for anything but my father this summer.'
Lucy was silent. Mrs. Burgoyne finished tying her shoes, then rose, and said lightly—
'Besides—poor book! It wanted a change badly. So did I.—Now Mr. Neal will see it through.'
* * * * *
Lucy went to say good-bye to Aunt Pattie before starting. Eleanor, left alone, stood a moment, thoughtful, beside the dressing-table.
'She is sorry for me!' she said to herself, with a sudden, passionate movement.
This was the Nemi day—the day of festival, planned a fortnight before, to celebrate the end, the happy end of the book. It was to have been Eleanor's special day—the sign and seal of that good fortune she had brought her cousin and his work.