There were letters which her father had written, pasted in, envelopes and all, to be read in certain longing moments when she had missed him and her mother. There were love letters from certain callow college boys—love—! She laughed now as she thought of the pale passion they had offered her.
Derry had had no word for her the night before when he had left her at her door. Her father had been with her, so Derry could only press her hand and watch her as she went in. But there had been no need for words. All the evening what they had felt had flamed between them—.
So with the desire to preserve a record of these marvellous moments which were crowding into her life, she chose a perfectly new book to be devoted to Derry. And on the first page she pasted, not the faded violet from the basket which had come to her yesterday—oh, day of days!—not the dance program on which Derry's name was most magically scrawled, nor the spring of heather, nor a handful of rose leaves from the offering of the morning—no, the very first thing that went into Jean's memory book was a frayed silken tassel that had been cut from a rose-colored curtain! She had carried down her little scissors the night before, and had snipped it, and here it was—an omen for her own rose-colored future!
Starry-eyed she lay back among her pillows.
"Oh, Polly-Ann, Polly-Ann," she said tensely, to the small cat on the cushions, "if I should ever wake up and find that it wasn't true—"
Polly-Ann stared at her with mystical green orbs. She could offer no help, but she served as a peg upon which Jean could hang her eloquence. She stretched herself luxuriously and purred.
"But it is true, Polly-Ann," Jean said, "and I am going to church with him—wasn't it beautiful that he should think of going to church with me on Thanksgiving morning, Polly-Ann?"
She dressed herself presently, making a sort of sacred rite of it—because of Derry. She was glad that she was pretty—because of Derry. Glad that her gray fur coat was becoming—glad of the red rose against it.
He came in his car, but they decided to walk.
"I always walk to church," said Jean.