"Then what's the use of seeing the world?"
"Why, one must live; and why not be happy?" answered Mrs. Vanderpool, amused, baffled, spurred for the time being from her chronic ennui.
"Are you happy?" retorted Zora, looking her over carefully, from silken stockings to garden hat. Mrs. Vanderpool laid aside her little mockery and met the situation bravely.
"No," she replied simply. Her eyes grew old and tired.
Involuntarily Zora's hand crept out protectingly and lay a moment over the white jewelled fingers. Then quickly recovering herself, she started hastily to withdraw it, but the woman's fingers closed around the darker ones, and Mrs. Vanderpool's eyes became dim.
"I need you, Zora," she said; and then, seeing the half-formed question, "Yes, and you need me; we need each other. In the world lies opportunity, and I will help you."
Zora rose abruptly, and Mrs. Vanderpool feared, with a tightening of heart, that she had lost this strangely alluring girl.
"I will come to-morrow," said Zora.
As Mrs. Vanderpool went in to lunch, reaction and lingering doubts came trouping back. To replace the daintiest of trained experts with the most baffling semi-barbarian, well!
"Have you hired a maid?" asked Helen.