Her kindness made his task easy.
"I've called to pay my respects to you—and to see Helen," he said.
"Of course. But talk to me first," she returned, with a smile. "You'll find me better company than that crowd upstairs. Tell me about yourself.... Oh, I know soldiers hate to talk about themselves and the war. Never mind the war. Are you well? Did you get hurt? You look so—so frail, Daren."
There was something simple and motherly about her, that became her, and warmed Lane's cold heart. He remembered that she had always preferred boys to girls, and regretted she had not been the mother of boys. So Lane talked to her, glad to find that the most ordinary news of the service and his comrades interested her very much. The instant she espied his Croix de Guerre he seemed lifted higher in her estimation. Yet she had the delicacy not to question him about that. In fact, after ten minutes with her, Lane had to reproach himself for the hostility with which he had come. At length she rose with evident reluctance.
"You want to see Helen. Shall I send her down here or will you go up to her studio?"
"I think I'd like to go up," replied Lane.
"If I were you, I would," advised Mrs. Wrapp. "I'd like your opinion—of, well, what you'll see. Since you left home, Daren, we've been turned topsy-turvy. I'm old-fashioned. I can't get used to these goings-on. These young people 'get my goat,' as Helen expresses it."
"I'm hopelessly behind the times, I've seen that already," rejoined Lane.
"Daren, I respect you for it. There was a time when I objected to your courting Helen. But I couldn't see into the future. I'm sorry now she broke her engagement to you."
"I—thank you, Mrs. Wrapp," said Lane, with agitation. "But of course Helen was right. She was too young.... And even if she had been—been true to me—I would have freed her upon my return."