ges back in their envelope. On the hearth the fire
burned low, and, slipping out of her chair, she sat upon the rug and
held her hands out shiveringly to the red ashes slowly turning gray.
The habit of childhood was upon her, and quiveringly she talked to
herself:

"You shouldn't have asked him to come Christmas! But how could I
have known? I only thought he would be lonely. He cares for so few
people and with all his wisdom has so little understanding of many
things in life. He is so intolerant of weakness and meanness, of
sham and show and pretence and make-believe that--that that's why you
like him, and you know it, Claudia Keith! You shouldn't have asked
him. You didn't know--but you knew before he went away. And he is
coming back." Slowly she got up. "No. He is not coming back. That
is, not yet, he isn't. You are not sure. Are you glad?" In the
mirror over the mantel she met her eyes unshrinkingly. "Yes, I am
glad," she said, and her lips whitened. "I am glad, but I am not
sure." In her eyes was strange appeal. "Vermont and Virginia!
Could we be happy? We are so different--and yet-- Perhaps in the
spring. . . . The winter months are very long. Oh, Winthrop Laine!"
She pressed her hands to her heart as if to still its sudden
throbbing, then reached for his letter and kissed it. "I wonder if I
am going to know what Lonely Land can mean!"

XXI

A VISIT FROM DOROTHEA

Dorothea settled herself more comfortably in her uncle's lap. "You
certainly ought to be thankful you've never had it," she said. "It's
worse than being a leper. I've never been a leper, but when you're
that you can go out, the Bible says so, and people just pass you by
on the other side and let you alone. With diphtheria they don't let
you alone. Lepers are just outcasts, but diphtherias--what are
people who have diphtheria?--well, whatever they are, they're cast in
and nobody can see them except the nurses and the doctor and your
mother and father. The doctor said father mustn't come in my room,
as he had to go to his business, and father told him to go to the
devil--I heard him. I just love the way father talks when he's mad.
I couldn't have stood the long days if it hadn't been for you and
father coming in every evening. They certainly do a lot of things
when you're sick with contagiousness. Everything you eat out of and
drink out of has to be boiled and stewed, and the things you spit in
burned up, and the