We dined and had a pleasant evening.  Doria did not raise the disastrous topic, but talked of Marienbad and her visits, and discussed the modern tendencies of the drama.  She prided herself on being in the forefront of progress, and found no dramatic salvation outside the most advanced productions of the Incorporated Stage Society.  I pleaded for beauty, which she called wedding-cake.  She pleaded for courage and truth in the presentation of actual life, which I called dull and stupid photography which any dismal fool could do.  We had quite an exciting and entirely profitless argument.

“I’m not going to listen any longer,” she cried at last, “to your silly old early Victorian platitudes!”

“And I,” I retorted, “am not going to be browbeaten in my own home by one-foot-nothing of crankiness and chiffon.”

So, laughingly, we parted for the night, the best of friends.  If only, I thought, she could sweep her head clear of Adrian, what a fascinating little person she might be.  And I understood how it had come to pass that our hulking old ogre had fallen in love with her so desperately.

The next morning I was in the garden, superintending the planting of some roses in a new, bed, when Doria, in hat and furs, came through my library window, and sang out a good-bye.  I hurried to her.

“Surely not going already?  I thought you were at least staying to lunch.”

No; she had to get back to town.  The car, ordered by Barbara, was waiting to take her to the station.

“I’ll see you into the train,” said I.

“Oh, please don’t trouble.”

“I will trouble,” I laughed, and I accompanied her down the slope to the front door where stood Barbara by the car and Franklin with the luggage.  Doria and I drove to the station.  For the few minutes before the train came in we walked up and down the platform.  She was in high spirits, full of jest and laughter.  An unwonted flush in her cheeks and a brightness in her deep eyes rendered her perfectly captivating.

“I haven’t seen you looking so well and so pretty for ever such a long time,” I said.

The flush deepened.  “You and Barbara have done me all the good in the world.  You always do.  Northlands is a sort of Fontaine de Jouvence for weary people.”

That was as graceful as could be.  And when she shook hands with me a short while afterwards through the carriage window, she thanked me for our long-sufferance with more spontaneous cordiality than she had ever before exhibited.  I returned to my roses, feeling that, after all, we had done something to help the poor little lady on her way.  If I had been a cat, I should have purred.  After an hour or so, Barbara summoned me from my contemplative occupation.

“Yes, dear?” said I, at the library window.

“Have you written to Rogers?”

Rogers was a plumber.

“He’s a degraded wretch,” said I, “and unworthy of receiving a letter from a clean-minded man.”