"No," she said. "It's a terrible thing to own up to."
And there again was the whole naked problem, as I had seen it for her, for Lena, for my mother, for all the women of Katytown, for Mrs. Carney, for Rose.... What was the matter? When love was in the world for us all, when at some time every one of us shared it—what was the reason that it came to this? Or—as I had seen almost as often—to the model "happy" home, which often bred selfishness and oblivion?
Yet in those days I confess that I thought far less about these things than I did of the simple joy of being in that workroom where he was.
There was a day of rain early in June—of rain so intense and compelling that when lunchtime came I left in the midst of it, while Mr. Ember was out of the room, so that he should not be constrained to ask me to stay. When I came back he scolded me.
"You didn't use good sense!" he said. "Why didn't you?"
"I used all I had," I replied with meekness.
"If that was all you had, you'd lose your job," he grumbled. "Never go out from here again in such a rain as that. Do you hear?"
Torchido not yet having returned from his lecture, Mr. Ember built up a cedar fire in the fireplace and made me dry my feet.
"I am going to make you a cup of tea," he said, "from some—"
"Don't tell me," I said, "that it's from the same kind that the emperor uses?"