“Whom is the letter from?” she faltered, and Joan tore open the envelope while her eyes drank in the words.

“It is from Sylvia Reed, Nan.  Her dream has come true.  She has her studio—­she wants me!”

“Joan, you will not go—­you must not!” All that Nancy dared to put in her plea she put in it then.

“Why not?” asked Joan impressed.  “Why not, Nan?”

“Aunt Dorrie——­” Nancy’s words ended in a sob.

“Aunt Dorrie shall decide.”

And with that Joan, her face radiant, her breath coming quick, walked from the room and on, on to the little chapel upstairs.

Doris was sitting by the window.  The day was going to be clear at its close, and a rift in the sullen clouds showed the gold behind; the light lay in a straight line across the chapel floor.

Doris was not in a depressed mood.  She often sat for an hour in the quiet place.  She took her tenderest treasures of thought there.  She had been thinking that afternoon of David Martin.  How wise he was!  What a friend!  How he understood her!  How unworthy she was of the richness that flooded her life!

It was then that Joan came in.  She did not go close to Doris—­the physical touch was not the first impulse with either of them.

“Aunt Dorrie, I have a letter from Sylvia Reed.”

Instantly Doris was stirred as Nancy had been.  Mentally she braced.  She recalled vividly Sylvia Reed, Joan’s particular friend at Miss Phillips’s.  The girl had genius where Joan had talent.  She had inherited enough to take her comfortably through school, had a small income besides, but she would have to work and win her way to the success she promised.  Sylvia’s ambition was only equalled by her belief in herself and her eagerness to prove it to others.  She was a few years older than Joan, and a girl of remarkable character and sweetness.

“She wants me, Aunt Dorrie.  She wants me to come to her.  She has a studio in New York; not down in that part of the city which Uncle David doesn’t like, the place where he says folks show off with the window shades up.  Sylvia is in the safe uptown where the real thing is!”

The eagerness in Joan’s hurrying voice made Doris smile.  The girl was trying to clear all obstacles away before coming to the point.  That was her way.

“Why, Aunt Dorrie, Sylvia has two orders for book covers, already, besides twelve hundred a year!”

The letter had been packed with ammunition and Joan was using it recklessly.

“Just listen, Aunt Dorrie.”

And Joan spread the letter on her knee; her hands were trembling as she patted it open.

“This is what Sylvia says: