"Shall we?" she said, and they slipped away together. But before they went I heard her calling his particular attention to one of the players, "the second from the left," she whispered, "the awfully handsome one"—a new note for Claire? Yes, just a little new.
And so we left it at last, driving out into the street through a small crowd of eager, white-faced children, for some of whom, no doubt, its walls were as the walls of Paradise. It was quite dark, with a blur of rain upon the carriage windows; and for a minute or two the hospital, with its long rows of lighted wards, towered dimly upon our left.
"Just like a great big liner," said Claire, who had been down to Southampton when Molly and Rupert sailed. And so indeed one could imagine it—lifting its strong sides above all these crowded roof-tops, with unshaken bows, and Hope upon the bridge, and Comfort, at least, to minister in its cabins.
"And yet there's something awful in it too," said Jeanie Graham.
"Chiefly," explained Horace philosophically, "because we're going home ourselves to an excellent Christmas dinner."
"And happen to be feeling rather well," said Esther.
"And partly, I suppose," added Jeanie, "because just now we're looking at it from the outside."
"And a little bit," I guessed, "because it stands, in a sense, for Knowledge with a big K. And there are times when we're all rather afraid of that—even when it wants to do us good."
"But we run to it in the end," smiled Jeanie.
Let me introduce you to her as she sits opposite to me in the brougham—or to so much of her as is not obscured by Claire, who is dividing her weight between Horace and his wife-apparent. Strictly speaking, I suppose, she is scarcely to be described as pretty. Her cheek-bones are the least shade too high, and her eyebrows just a trifle too level. Here and there too her skin, still clinging to its Highland brown, is powdered with tiny freckles; and though her nose is straight enough, a purist might consider her mouth too big, and her chin perhaps a little too firm—but very pleasantly so. Her hair is dark and wavy, and in its natural setting—a grey tam-'o-shanter, I think, and the tail of a Scotch mist—might well contain the deep, divine, dark dayshine of the poet. And indeed I have been assured that it does. I have left her eyes to the last, because at present she is standing away from them a little. Regarded as mere windows to her mind they are well opened, clear, and grey. But Horace, who has seen their owner leaning out of them, could no doubt describe them better. And we think that he's a fortunate young man.