arranged in a
pile. She worked with the steady concentration that is produced by
the successful effort to think down some unwelcome thought by means of
another thought. Having absorbed the unwelcome thought, her mind went
on with additional vigor, derived from the victory; on a sheet of paper
lines of figures and symbols frequently and firmly written down marked
the different stages of its progress. And yet it was broad daylight;
there were sounds of knocking and sweeping, which proved that living
people were at work on the other side of the door, and the door, which
could be thrown open in a second, was her only protection against the
world. But she had somehow risen to be mistress in her own kingdom,
assuming her sovereignty unconsciously.

Steps approached her unheard. It is true that they were steps that
lingered, divagated, and mounted with the deliberation natural to one
past sixty whose arms, moreover, are full of leaves and blossoms; but
they came on steadily, and soon a tap of laurel boughs against the door
arrested Katharine's pencil as it touched the page. She did not move,
however, and sat blank-eyed as if waiting for the interruption to cease.
Instead, the door opened. At first, she attached no meaning to the
moving mass of green which seemed to enter the room independently of any
human agency. Then she recognized parts of her mother's face and person
behind the yellow flowers and soft velvet of the palm-buds.

"From Shakespeare's tomb!" exclaimed Mrs. Hilbery, dropping the entire
mass upon the floor, with a gesture that seemed to indicate an act of
dedication. Then she flung her arms wide and embraced her daughter.

"Thank God, Katharine!" she exclaimed. "Thank God!" she repeated.

"You've come back?" said Katharine, very vaguely, standing up to receive
the embrace.

Although she recognized her mother's presence, she was very far from
taking part in the scene, and yet felt it to be amazingly appropriate
that her mother should be there, thanking God emphatically for
unknown blessings, and strewing the floor with flowers and leaves from
Shakespeare's tomb.

"Nothing else matters in the world!" Mrs. Hilbery continued. "Names
aren't everything; it's what we feel that's everything. I didn't want
silly, kind, interfering letters. I didn't want your father to tell me.
I knew it from the first. I prayed that it might be so."

"You knew it?" Katharine repeated her mother's words softly and vaguely,
looking